In God's Eyes, Even Misfits Are Precious!
by The Universal Storyteller
Summary: This story will feature new Sailors, Knights, allies, and enemies. They're all perhaps quite a bit different than many, if not all, other fan-created or canonical SM-related or PR-related characters are. I hope you all will enjoy meeting them all!
1. Prologue: Goodbye! Hello!

Before I begin to tell this story to you all here, I must say the following things, for all the obvious reasons, here. Sailor Moon was created by Naoko Takeuchi, and I claim no ownership over characters of her own creation. I also claim no ownership of any other characters I did not create in any other story universes. However, any character that you do not recognize well as being of anyone else's creation, are unquestionably mine, unless otherwise stated. Except where otherwise stated and/or obvious, then, all settings, et cetera, that you may find in the following pages of this story and/or any other related ones that I may write, are of my own creation, and I expect them to be treated as such.

This story is set in the exact same dimension of the Universe that my original story The Dreamrose Dancers is now set in. As such, much may, and will, be different from any other dimension, timeline, et cetera, that you may be yet familiar with, either in original fiction, fan fiction, or real life. There'll be periodical appearances of many characters you might recognize from other story universes, et cetera, in this story and/or any potential sequels that might later arise to this story here, for that matter. Although those very same assorted characters' respective vital facts may be at least a little different from what you people might generally expect for any or all of them, if not considerably different, in fact, they may, and perhaps will, show up at least every so often in this story and/or any potential sequels to it.

Now without further ado, people, I really do hope that you'll all like the story I'm now embarking on here, of course. It may not yet be quite as extensive in size and quite as action-packed as Angus MacSpon's rather huge story _Sailor Moon 4200_ actually is now, but I still fully expect that it'll ultimately still be of quite considerable enough size and of quite considerable action, once it's also put out here quite well enough, just the same, everyone. And, if I'm not mistaken, he's actually been working on it for much longer than I have with this particular story of mine here. Several years longer, without a real doubt here, by far. Now let's get on with our story here, and away we go!

* * *

Prologue: Goodbye, Enterprise! Hello, Exile!

* * *

I didn't believe her for a moment, and I offer no excuses now for not actually doing so when I should've then done so. But when I failed to realize that it was far more than just a stone that our enemies were after, many thousands of beings who might possibly have been saved were lost much sooner than they might have otherwise been. They could possibly have been saved if I'd actually listened to my fellow Princess Colleen of the House Warner on Batosku, a good-sized planet in our home solar system, more than 1,000 years ago. I should've actually listened to her and many others during the last three days and/or nights, at most, of my own people's Kerpatan Lunar Kingdom, in fact.

Let me explain, then, if I may, everyone. You people may already know all about the Moon Kingdom in the Milky Way Galaxy's Sol System and how it came to its rather tragic end quite well. But you don't yet know the story of how certain things ultimately came to an end for our people in the Selonagi solar system quite some length of time long ago. Life is still present in our home solar system, to at least a minimal degree. But it's very hard indeed to locate now. For our enemies virtually destroyed much of it on our worlds and in or on our home system's star, when they came to it long before now. Our last Kingdom fell about 24 months before the Moon Kingdom did, more or less, if my memory actually serves me well enough at the current time here. And those of us who actually survived its fall somehow and who managed to make it to the Moon well enough, eventually spent the rest of our then-ongoing lives there. Eventually, though, many of us fell in battle against our mutual enemies when it fell as well. And many of us fell then alongside such noble warriors as Sailors Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, and Venus. To name just four of them out of perhaps many hundreds of warriors, if not at least thousands, millions, or even more warriors than that.

I'm not going to recount the Moon Kingdom's rather tragic fall here, however, to you all, people. For that particular story has been told by many other people all over Earth here for a very long time, from what I've somehow learned ever since my eventual re-initiation as Sailor Kilakogo one wintery day in January of AD 2008. But I'll still share how my failure to believe one of my dearest friends and fellow Sailors sufficiently well, when I should've actually done so then, soon led to the needless deaths of many who might possibly have been saved, to the best of my own current ability here. Among many other stories I'll share with you, if and whenever I get a chance to do so well enough, in fact. However, according to at least one, if not more than one, of my Sailor Team's Guardians, there's much I still have to remember of my past time in my own Kerpatan Lunar Kingdom. For I don't yet have all my memories of that time back, if I ever will. I may eventually get all of them back well enough. But right now, at least, there is much I still can't remember of my time in it. Like several of the places I most enjoyed being in before our enemies eventually came to do what they were once known for before finally being purified or destroyed by Sailor Moon and her Team of Sol System Sailors and Knights, among many others, for instance. I can't remember certain rather important places well enough to suit me. At least not currently, anyway. For a good portion of my memories related to such places, among other things, aren't yet fully restored to me, if they'll ever be.

And I'll tell you at least one or two stories of what's happened to me and many others in the time that's passed ever since I was rather unexpectedly re-initiated as Sailor Kilakogo while in the Milky Way Galaxy's Sol System, many light-years away from my own people's home solar system in it. First, though, you must begin with the end of our system's last Kingdom, for it is from there, my story begins.

* * *

Outside Princess Faith's Starmoon Palace Chambers

Enterprise, Kerpatan Lunar Kingdom, Kilakogo

June 24, 989

I encountered one of my dearest and closest friends in the Milky Way Galaxy's Selonagi Solar System just as I was exiting my chambers on the way to the Starmoon Palace's main dining hall somewhere in Enterprise, Kerpata. She came up to me in a very fast run, as if something really bad was chasing her, and as if she was also really afraid that it would get her and those close enough to her in her life. She said, "Faith, our Negaverse enemies will now be landing on Kilakogo in no more than two or three days, according to both Sage and Ariel. They've just destroyed several dozen ships and space stations quite near Esperus. And they've now wiped out virtually all, if not all, known sentient life on Weikobi, Eternium, Terron, and Hadron. Esperus's nations are now evacuating all possible sentient beings from their mini-system as they possibly can to here. They'll then arrive here within 24 to 48 hours, if they possibly can. But they'll still not be able to outrun our enemies very easily, it seems. If at all, in fact."

Weikobi was the sixth planet in our solar system. Eternium, the seventh. Terron, the eighth. And Hadron, the ninth. I, and many others from various worlds and our own solar system's star, were now on its third planet's moon of Kilakogo, however. Other worlds in our system besides the above-mentioned ones were Batosku, the first planet; Cyanon, the second; Igekaxou, the third; and Padorphu, the fourth; from Selonagi on out in it. Several of the outer planets in the system had at least a few moons with colonies on them. Or they once did, before our enemies had gotten to them quite well enough at least a little while before the present calendar date, in fact.

I was at least somewhat, if not rather, well-acquainted with any number of people from the aforementioned places in our solar system. And most especially with certain people who were generally rather high-ranking in their respective worlds' governments. Except for a rare few who weren't so high-ranking, normally. Such as the precious one who now held my own heart in his beautiful hands, and who I was deeply in love with. Even though many people in our system really didn't like the idea much, if at all, for instance.

The precious one I was deeply in love with was actually from Selonagi. But he wasn't the only young man who was quite interested in me at the current time in my life. I had many admirers and many suitors from all over the solar system. Including several from Igekaxou, the planet which Kilakogo now orbited around in it, for instance.

"You can't be serious, Colleen. Our enemies can't have already done that by now! The last I heard, they were primarily going after the beings in the Shusat Solar System at least one solar system away from here, if my information is sufficiently accurate here." I gave her my most skeptical look that I possibly could then give her at the present time. Even while also holding a crystal pitcher mostly full of water in my right hand and a tall semi-translucent glass in my left, I still did so here. Princess Colleen of the House Warner on Batosku was now just about four Terran months past her fourteenth birthday, while I was about two Terran months away from my seventeenth one.

"They were, but when they somehow then detected your dear mother's Enterprise Starmoon Crystal, they almost immediately turned towards this solar system full-bore. And then they quite quickly shifted their forces in this part of our Galaxy directly towards us here. The Negaverse already had forces present in our system, as you might already know by now. But now they'll be coming in even more force than we even thought they actually would be able to come at us with, it seems! We're not going to be able to hold them off very well, for that matter! Many will die, and you and your Kingdom will be where the final battle takes place. Do what you can to save those you can, Faith. Or, so help me, many more sentient beings from our solar system will die who might possibly have been saved from many places in this system of ours! Such as all our parents, for example!"

"Ariel and Sage are both Dreamers, as are both of their Knights, Colleen. They generally all spend much of their time just locked away in their respective chambers or in often going various places anywhere at all that are usually quite a distance away from the rest of us, doing whatever thing or things that they most often do. Whatever it or they might be, I'm not entirely sure. But they, and many others of their kinds, seem quite weird indeed to me, to tell you the truth." I poured a glass of water for Colleen, the most fiery member of my system's Junior Planetary Court. And her hair was as red as the fire that she often wielded as a Sailor for our system's Sailor Corps, for that matter.

"Melody and Chad think we should do what we can to save those who we can, based on what Ariel and Sage have already told the rest of your own Court here. Including me, of course, Faith. And you know how often I agree with Ariel, Sage, AND Chad, I'm quite sure!" Colleen and Chad almost never agreed with each other on anything, as far as I then knew about them both in my own life here on Kilakogo, in fact.

"Oh, they do, do they? Well, how do they know that what the Dreamers are now saying is true? They could just be trying to cause a mental eclipse epidemic here on Kilakogo of some sort," I said, as I quickly handed her the aforementioned water in an attempt to cool her down at least a little bit here, before she then woke up the rest of the Palace's inhabitants here who weren't awake at the present time.

Colleen grabbed me, and shook me, once she'd then drained the water in that glass well enough here. She then asked, in a rather heated voice, "Rebel, many who could possibly have been saved, whether unborn or born, will die if you don't do what needs to be done here in time, no matter what it is! They ARE coming! They now have ACTUALLY somehow captured several of the minor Crystals from various sentient beings in our solar system, which they're now using against our own system's inhabitants! They're UNQUESTIONABLY gaining power in our system quite rapidly indeed because of it. By this time tomorrow, Esperus and its own mini-system WILL be theirs, without even the slightest shadow of a doubt. Especially since Thora and her parents, for instance, are no longer there in their very own mini-system. How many more of our worlds in this solar system have to be conquered or attacked here before you'll actually believe me well enough here?"

"Don't tell me that you believe them, Colleen!"

"I do, for I myself have seen the blackness begin to even more rapidly envelop this solar system ever since they detected your dear mother's Crystal, Faith. They are most definitely heading this way now. And they'll not be stopped very easily, if at all. All our Planetary Court Crystals are most definitely in quite grave danger. And if we don't act as we need to act, they may then fall into our enemies' hands! Do you really want them to use our Crystals against any number of other populated worlds in our own Milky Way Galaxy that we might possibly know of well enough at the present time or not?"

"No, of course not. But I still think the Dreamers are really not telling us the complete truth here. If any truth at all, for that matter, Colleen."

"Your stubbornness will get people killed, Faith. And when it does, many may not think very highly of you any longer, if they even live long enough, somehow, to do even that."

"So be it, if that's true. Many of them already hate me quite a bit indeed, I'm quite sure, for falling in love with my precious Theo when I did. If you're so afraid that some major trouble is coming here, then you should most certainly tell my parents, if you so dare!"

"And what would you think if they even try to destroy Selonagi, from which your precious love comes from, then, Princess Faith?"

"Selonagi is not going to be destroyed by them, no matter what, Colleen."

"Maybe not, but that certainly won't stop them from trying, I'm sure. Your precious Theo would most certainly be very displeased with you if his home got destroyed because of your stubbornness, if I'm not too mistaken here."

"It won't. They'd first have to get deep enough into Selonagi in order to have a good enough chance to do that, somehow. And it would take many more power crystals than they might currently have to do just that, I think."

"My sources tell me that they now have enough power crystals to potentially cause several nearby stars to nova or supernova at any time, if they might so desire. Without Theo and his people actually present in and around Selonagi well enough, they could potentially be able to somehow do that to our own system's star, it seems to me. In which case, my world would be destroyed, as would Melody's, at the very least, if not also Igekaxou and/or Kilakogo, as well, due to the brief rapid expansion of Selonagi prior to its explosion. In which case, millions more of our system's inhabitants will most likely die who could perhaps have been saved! If not even billions or more of others!"

"Do what you feel you must, then, Fire-head! But unless I see the truth of their words well enough for myself, I'll not believe it for a moment to a substantial enough degree!"

"Ugh! Must you be so blasted stubborn here? You're like a Gomabara six-tentacled eel-rat when it's quite bound and determined to hold onto its Matacha prey for a meal! If you're not going to listen to me right now, I'm going to find someone here who actually will do so!" She then rather angrily slammed the now-empty glass quite loudly back on the silver platter I'd gotten it off of near my chambers' outer doors, before running away from me here even faster than she'd been running in the hall nearest them before I encountered her outside them. A rather loud bang of sorts then sounded, just before I resumed heading in the direction of this Palace's main dining hall, at a rather leisurely pace, in fact.

A Gomabara six-tentacled eel-rat was an amphibious animal from Batosku whose primary kind of prey, but not its only one, was an animal similar to an average Terran rabbit, but which spent most of its life living underground feasting on assorted plants or sleeping in it. That kind of animal was called a Matacha, in fact. Gomabara six-tentacled eel-rats would often even fight each other periodically for such prey, and most often during their peak mating seasons, according to Colleen. They could normally reproduce offspring twice a Terran year, but they normally did so the most only during times of rather cool weather on Batosku, due to the fact that the planet's average distance from Selonagi in our solar system was about 30 million miles, more or less, as it orbited Selonagi in 120 Terran days.

Eventually, at about 6:30 in the morning, then, I arrived in the aforementioned main dining hall to find my parents in often-serious conversation with several of the parents to members of my Sailor Team as they were each having their respective breakfasts with each other in it. This was a rather common occurrence here during most mornings that we were in residence at Enterprise's Starmoon Palace here, in fact.

My mother Baitraji saw me well enough before I saw her. And she soon called me over to the table she was then at with several of the other members of our respective Planetary Courts from other worlds in our solar system. I really wasn't in the mood to do so. But I knew that if I didn't, I'd probably be unable to just hang out for a while with my beloved Theo of the commoner House Norris of Selonagi today in the Moon Garden not far from the Starmoon Palace as we were planning to do later on, if at all possible. So I came over, even though I didn't really want to do that now, to wherever she then was in the main dining hall. For my mother was as much a stickler for complete obedience in many situations as I was for breaking the known rules in them whenever I possibly could. But she could punish me somewhat severely if I didn't obey her whenever she summoned me to her presence. And now was not a good time to disobey her, it seemed to me at the current time, as well. So I went over to her, as already stated.

When I did, I found her with a total of fourteen other members of our respective Planetary Courts. Seven of them were from her Court, and seven others were from mine. From her Court, there were the members from Batosku, Cyanon, Igekaxou, Padorphu, Esperus, Weikobi, and Eternium. From mine, there were the members from those same seven planets. The absent members of our two Courts were mostly, though not entirely, otherwise occupied elsewhere in the system at the present time, as I'd later find out.

From her Court, there were now present Queens Sitoba, Jatoma, Haugabauka, Helen, and three other Queens I wasn't yet very familiar enough with, if I'd ever be, in my life here on Kilakogo. Queen Sitoba was from Batosku, Queen Jatoma from Cyanon, Queen Haugabauka from Padorphu, and Queen Helen from Esperus, respectively. And the other three unfamiliar Queens to me were from Igekaxou, Weikobi, and Eternium, of course.

From my Court, there were now present Colleen of the House Warner from Batosku, Melody of the House Wade from Cyanon, Ariel of the House Byrd from Eternium, and four others I'd not yet seen, heard about, or heard from, this morning. The other four members of my Court who were now present were Flora of the House Palmer from Igekaxou, Abigail of the House Breedlove from Padorphu, Thora of the House Justice from Esperus, and Renee of the House Holliday from Weikobi. Of the aforementioned seven young women, I normally got along the best with Colleen, Melody, Abigail, and Thora. As for Flora, I normally got along only so-so with her. And as for Ariel and Renee, I normally got along somewhat poorly, at best, with them, in my life.

Colleen had red hair and brown eyes. Melody light blue hair and green eyes. Ariel blonde hair and brown eyes. Flora mostly green hair with pink streaks and green eyes. Abigail naturally black hair which she normally dyed mostly blonde and brown eyes, Thora brown hair and brown eyes. And Renee dark purple hair and blue eyes.

I soon sat down at the table where the aforementioned fifteen other people, including Mother, now were in the main dining hall here, and waited for Mother to ask me the questions she would often ask me in situations like this. Hopefully, there wouldn't be too many. And hopefully I would be able to answer them well enough to suit her here, as well. Although I didn't yet know what they were, I hoped they wouldn't bring unnecessary trouble for Theo and me in my life, just the same, for the obvious reasons.

She and the rest of us consumed our respective breakfasts for a while with each other, before she set down her eating utensils on our table near herself. She then looked around at the rest of the people at our table, before finally locking her eyes right on me as I was taking a bite of some bread from my plate, and saying, "Colleen tells me that you don't believe that the Negaverse will be here very soon, Faith. Explain to me why you think that."

"Because Ariel and Sage, among others, are Dreamers here, Honored Mother. They have predicted great calamity before, and been shown to be quite wrong in their predictions of doom in this system."

"That may be so, Faith, but I have it on quite good authority from other sources that their predictions in this case are quite accurate. Remember, we do have contact with various people in the Shusat Solar System, for instance. And they have confirmed those predictions quite well indeed. Would you doubt your friends from Imugo and Anikua in the Shusat Solar System, for instance? They have confirmed them to be entirely accurate indeed. And you know that they wouldn't generally say something was the case if it wasn't."

Imugo was the seventh planet in the Shusat solar system, and Anikua was the twelfth. The Shusat solar system had sixteen planets in it. But only eight of them were incontrovertibly known well enough by us to be hospitable enough for humanoid life most, if not all, of the time. We knew for sure that the first eight planets in the system were normally, if not always, that way. But we weren't so sure about the last eight in the system. And we didn't yet know for sure if the system's star was also sufficiently hospitable to such life, for that matter.

"That's true, I suppose. Ayatami wouldn't normally be mistaken about such things, I think, Honored Mother, for she is generally a very cautious person when she speaks or writes about something in her life, if I remember her well enough right now in it." Ayatami was the current holder of the Imugo Sailor Crystal in the Shusat system, for that matter, in her life. She wielded powers in her system related to detection of numerous things and to music. While still others in her solar system wielded various other powers that were present for each of them then on their own respective home planets in it.

Other planets in the Shusat solar system that we now knew of well enough were Opumuzu, Kabea, Excalibur, Joyeuse, Lightsaber, Negemu, Jorai, Eugoci, Nowedu, Otefeba, Gefeis, Covaus, Govo, and Heteum, from Shusat on out. The first seven of those planets were known to be sufficiently hospitable to humanoid life at least normally, if not all the time, by us. I had at least occasionally encountered several people from the Shusat solar system whenever I'd actually traveled a bit to other worlds in our system or elsewhere in our Galaxy, in fact. And I eventually developed a rather close friendship with at least a few of them that still continued to this particular time in my own life.

I even had made friends with several people from other solar systems in our own Milky Way Galaxy. Including ones from the Sol System of it, by the way. But at the current time, we really hadn't heard very much from that part of the Galaxy, for yet-unknown reasons to us.

"No, she wouldn't, Faith. So I think that you had better consider that what Ariel and Sage and their Knights are saying may very well be true here. Knowing you, though, you most likely won't until the hard evidence is right there in front of your face. And not even until many people are falling in battle against them here on Kilakogo, I think."

"Honored Mother, how can we be so certain that they'll defeat us here on Kilakogo, if it truly comes to a final battle here? Just because they might be able to do it elsewhere in our system doesn't mean that they'll be able to do it here well enough, you know."

"Faith, there are many people who have now turned traitor to our various kingdoms in this system, and who are now working to overthrow them. For whatever good that'll do them when the Negaverse eventually feels they're no longer worthy of existence. Even after helping them to conquer or to destroy our kingdoms here in it. As I'm sure that they will, by the way."

"Can you name at least a few of them, then, Honored Mother?"

"Irbeyaru, Zashakrau, and Mokedru of House Toyikamoy on Esperus, for instance. We just learned this morning that they began feeding information to the Negaverse about a year or two ago, it seems. And when they somehow learned how to detect my Enterprise Starmoon Crystal even from outside our own solar system before we realized they could do so, they soon notified the nearest Negaverse military base that they could find. Ever since, they awaited a chance to notify the Negaverse of when might possibly be the very best time to move in on our system's various worlds most effectively. They then waited as patiently as they possibly could on or near Esperus, normally, for a specific time when our various kingdoms' defenses were either down or otherwise occupied. And then they told their Negaverse contacts when it was the very best time for them to attack us in the very near future, just as soon as they knew that well enough for themselves. So now we are under increasingly heavy attack from the Negaverse. And it's not going to get better for us any time soon, if at all, I'm quite sure here, Faith."

"Is there any way we can stop them, then?"

"No, the prophecies of this time are QUITE clear. They WILL be coming for us, and they WILL be coming in untold numbers that we WILL not be able to withstand well enough, without a doubt. It has been nearly 372,000 Terran days since an enemy like the Negaverse has wreaked havoc on this system's worlds, Faith. This will be at least the third time such an enemy has wreaked havoc quite like this on our system's worlds, if not even more than that. And it also will be the last time until a new Age begins for our people someday yet in the future, if any of our kingdom's inhabitants somehow survive into it well enough, in fact."

"I'm not familiar with such prophecies, Honored Mother," I stated, as I finished the last of the bread then on my plate here in the main dining hall.

"This is because we somehow couldn't manage to make you sufficiently aware of them in your life. For certain major things have happened in our solar system since your birth to us that required our attentions much more than we'd have preferred they didn't. As a result, we never were able to make you sufficiently aware of them, it seems to me, Faith. We may still not be able to do that quite well enough here. But at least we can still try to make you at least a little familiar with them, just the same. After you and your Sailor Team eventually get done with your training session today, you all are to report almost immediately to Destiny's chambers. This will be from where you and the rest of your Sailor Team will be escorted to the Hall of Ages on Terron, soon afterward. It is a somewhat rare place on Terron which our Negaverse enemies have still not somehow managed to reach well enough, quite fortunately enough. There are several dozen Terronian Rangers there who will meet with you briefly. And they also will continue to defend the area around the Hall of Ages to the best of their respective abilities while you're all still there."

"What are we to do there, once there, Honored Mother?" I soon finished the rest of a glass of milk from an Esperusan animal that looked much like, and was much like, a Terran cow.

"You all are to do whatever Destiny and Myron tell you to do, of course, Faith. For the Hall of Ages is still sufficiently under their own world's control. No matter what it is, if they tell you to do something, you do it, without question. Do I make myself quite clear?"

"Yes, Honored Mother, you do."

I really didn't like taking orders from anyone in my life. But when it came to people who were enough like my mother, for example, I most definitely had to obey them to the very best of my ability to do so at any time in my own mortal life. Or else I'd most certainly be regretting not doing so very much indeed. I also realized that her orders to report almost immediately after our Sailor Team's training session to Destiny's chambers would most likely preclude any chance that my plans for today would be achievable. But the tone with which she'd just given them to me here and now most definitely allowed no room at all for potential debating of them. Especially with many others then present near us both, in fact.

"You actually want sufficient enough proof of what we say, Faith? Then, by God's Light, you will see it, if at all possible," said Ariel, not long after I answered Mother's most recent question here. "You then will see that we aren't lying. Even if we have to beat it through your stubbornly thick head somehow, if at all possible!"

"I'd really like to see you try, if you dare, Ariel!"

"Oooh, I'd just love to smack you around so much, Faith. But I can't actually do it here and now, of course! Just you wait for our training session today, then. You are so getting it from me, if at all possible!"

"I bet you would really love to do just that. But I'm so out of your league, I think, that you won't be able to do it alone, if at all, Ariel."

"Maybe you are, but I've got friends who have most certainly had more than enough of your high-horse attitudes here, I'm quite sure, Doorknob!"

"How dare you call me that, Miss Vacuum-Brains!"

"That's it! When we get to our training session, you're going down, Buster!"

"Settle down right now, you two! Or you both will feel the wrath of Batosku now! Save it for the training session, you two," Colleen suddenly shouted here at the both of us. Meaning Ariel and me, of course.

"And if you two don't, then you two can count me in on that, for once," Melody rather unexpectedly said to us both here. Melody wielded powers relating to water, mainly, if not entirely, as a member of our system's Sailor Corps from Cyanon. Her planet was a planet which orbited Selonagi in 240 days, at about twice the average distance from Selonagi as Batosku generally did in our system, for that matter. Melody normally was a rather quiet person in her own life. But even she had her limits of what she actually would tolerate near her at a certain time in her life, of course. And even though she was unquestionably one of the closest friends to me and to certain others on my Sailor Team, she really didn't like seeing any of us fight much in our lives if we didn't really have to in them.

So, seeing as we were clearly up against the forces of Fire and Water, at least, we both backed down for at least a little while. But even we all knew that this matter wasn't yet settled sufficiently between me and certain other members of my Sailor Team, for many reasons most likely too numerous to name fully well enough here and now.

Abigail soon tried to lighten the mood by asking her own mother, "Dearest Mother, do you think we'll all find a lasting true love in this lifetime for ourselves, if we haven't already done so, by any chance?"

Queen Haugabauka thought quietly for a moment, before answering, "No, unfortunately, I don't, my sweet Abigail. I truly would wish otherwise for all of you girls, of course. But I too have long seen the trouble arising that's most definitely now heading our way in this Galaxy and this solar system of ours. I did not tell you before about it, for I really wanted you to have as pleasant a childhood as possible in your life here in our system, at least. And, for that, I'm truly sorry. But my real love for you, among many other things, somehow kept me from actually telling you all of this before now. Those of our system's sentient inhabitants who do not currently have a true love like that in their respective lives will most definitely not find it now before this system's last Kingdom falls. Selonagi's Kingdom will actually fall, as well. But a remnant will still remain to restore it someday yet in the future, just the same. Many from Selonagi and all the other inhabited worlds and space stations in our system will most certainly die now. But there will still be remnants left of their respective inhabitants to eventually somehow restore our various worlds and Selonagi to the levels of hospitability that they each once had here in this solar system. That's if they no longer have them at the current time, or if they won't always have them, by the way."

"What of Randolph, then, at least, Dearest Mother?" asked Abigail, as she then rather suddenly began to cry here, at least unconsciously at first, for all the obvious reasons. Abigail was quite often one to cry in her own life. And many things would quite often cause her to cry rather suddenly indeed, without much, if any, prior warning at all for anyone else in it.

"He will survive, as will many of our people, sweet Abigail. It will be you two who will begin to restore the remnant of our people to Padorphu's own surface in the next Age, when the need arises for you to then do so."

"But will you be with us when that happens, by any chance, Dearest Mother?" Abigail then rose from her chair and suddenly began to grab whatever she could get her hands on easily enough in the main dining hall. For she was often known to throw any number of assorted things whenever she was particularly upset during one of her quite common bouts of crying. As soon as everyone else besides the rest of us in the main dining hall saw that well enough, the Palace's main dining hall began to clear out rather rapidly indeed. For Abigail was usually very accurate indeed whenever she actually threw things during one of her quite common crying bouts, in fact. Almost immediately after she picked up a rather heavy and rather large iron vase that was just about six feet tall and just about four feet wide at its greatest extent, the only sentient beings that were still left in the Palace's main dining hall were the sixteen of us. We had all often enough seen her rather upset during her quite common crying bouts. So we were not too surprised at all when she then did so. She was now, chronologically speaking, only about two weeks short of her twelfth birthday in Terran calendar years. But she looked more like someone who was at least eighteen such years old, physically speaking, in her own mortal life. For many of the people on her home planet would mature physically much quicker than the average humanoid being that we were sufficiently familiar with in our lives might normally do. And her mind was also at just about the same maturity level, more or less, for that matter. Abigail, in fact, was now just about 5'10" and just about 170 pounds, from what we knew of her now in her life.

"Only God knows for sure whether that will be the case, Abigail. My life is in His Hands. If it is truly His will that I am around then, I will be, of course. But if not, so be it. However, I will be with you always, no matter what, when the next Age comes, I'm quite sure."

Abigail then threw that iron vase as if it were just a mere pebble against one of the nearby walls in the main dining hall, aiming for a very specific spot on it that a Tohatakun Mycorian Beetle was trying to escape into with a golden cocoon from a certain kind of silkworm native to Kilakogo. The beetle was forced to drop its potential meal, and soon met its rather-unexpected end when it was smashed into mere shreds against that very same Palace wall by the aforementioned vase. Abigail then very carefully retrieved the golden cocoon and placed it right back where it'd quite obviously come from not too long before, before rather suddenly pulling the vase back out of the wall the beetle had just been on here. A rather huge hole was now present in that particular wall there, right after she removed the necessary vase from there, of course. A hole that actually would remain there for the rest of our now-shrinking time on Kilakogo, by the way.

"Did you see that, everyone? She smashed that beetle into mere shreds!" said Thora, in quite considerable amazement, for she'd rarely seen Abigail throw things at speeds of at least 200 miles a Terran hour. Even during many other rather common crying bouts of Abigail's in our respective lives. Normally, Abigail's top velocities, at least in terms of throwing various things in her life, only approached about 160 miles a Terran hour. But this throw's velocity was at least 50 percent faster than that, if not even faster than that, as far as we could then tell here well enough.

"I really don't want anything of any possible kind that's sufficiently bad in its own nature to ever happen to you at all, Dearest Mother."

"Nor do I, of course. But if it's going to happen, it's going to happen, whether any of us might like it or not. I can't prevent everything that I might want to ever be able to prevent somehow in my own mortal life. Nobody can, I think. If I happen to die, then I will die. If I happen to live, then I will live. In either case, though, I still will be with you always. Even until the Final Age as we might now know of it in our respective lives then comes to pass, Abigail."

Abigail then bashed several nearby pillars in the main dining hall here for at least a little while. First just with the iron vase, and then with her fists, when she didn't actually get the results she was then looking for against them here well enough. Thora soon said, "Oh, my! She is really ticked now, it seems. We'd best get her out of here now, before she brings this whole main dining hall down on top of us here, I think!"

With no further delay, then, we all began to move towards her, all fifteen of us. Led by her mother, of course. When we all began doing so, she soon turned and fled, just as fast as she then could do that here well enough, from the main dining hall. And she soon tossed assorted things towards us all as we then did so, not really wanting us to catch her, if she could possibly somehow avoid it at all.

Several of those things soon hit Renee here. And that then got her very mad at Abigail, in very short order, by the way. Renee rarely, if ever, would get along at all with Abigail in their respective lives, so that really didn't help matters between them both at all here and now. Especially since Renee quite often had to help repair the damage that Abigail might periodically cause in her life whenever she was then having a crying bout in it, in fact. Abigail had much against Renee and assorted others in her own life, from what I then knew of their relationship with each other. And vice versa, for that matter. This latest bout of crying here for Abigail most certainly wouldn't change things for the better between them both either.

Renee really tried to restrain herself from then going into her Sailor mode, But she was quite unsuccessful in doing so. Even though her mother also really tried to help her do so here. Rather uncharacteristically for her, at least, then, she didn't even give her mother much of a chance to do that, if any chance at all, in fact. She then quickly ducked behind a still-intact pillar in the Palace's main courtyard, and suddenly powered up into her own Sailor state of being as Sailor Weikobi mere seconds later. She then did those two things here after being unexpectedly hit again at least a few more times on her legs and shoulder by several other good-sized items most definitely sent her direction by Abigail.

"Your behind is mine when I catch up to you, Abigail!" shouted Sailor Weikobi, not too long after she then powered up into her Sailor state as such.

"In your dreams, Miss Sawbones! I spit at your idle threats!" came the inevitable reply seconds later from Abigail. "I'll cry if I want to, and you can't stop me, Hatchet Girl!"

"Watch me! Say your prayers, Stoneheart!"

"We've got to stop them both, somehow, everyone," said Flora, as soon as those comments from Sailor Weikobi reached her ears well enough. "Knowing them, they'll probably try to kill each other, if at all possible."

"I agree," Mother said, seconds later. "Sitoba and the rest of my fellow Queens here, it seems we're going to have to go Imperial here to stop this particular crying bout of Abigail's from totally ruining this Palace's grounds, then. Let's do it, everyone. Faith, summon the rest of your Sailor Team to help out here as best as you currently can. We'll see to the Palace's grounds. But if I know her well enough, she won't easily stay on them if Sailor Weikobi is chasing her now. Take the rest of your Sailor Team to the Setakonai Heights area. For if we know her well enough, as I think we do, she will soon flee to there while also hoping to somehow escape Sailor Weikobi well enough. Sailor Weikobi hasn't actually been there before, if I'm not too mistaken here. So take the rest of your Sailor Team there, without also letting Sailor Weikobi know of it, if at all possible. Find them both, and contain them both, as best and as quickly as you all possibly can, then, quite obviously enough."

I nodded in complete agreement with Mother here, in terms of her most recent orders to me. I then quickly summoned the rest of my Sailor Team to where we now all were on the Palace's grounds. Even as Mother and the other seven Queens presently with her then double-powered up into their respective Imperial Sailor states of being, by the way. When they were all powered up as each of them then needed to be here, all eight of the Imperial Sailors now present here quickly began to try to repair the increasingly considerable amount of damage that Abigail and/or Sailor Weikobi had just begun to cause on the Palace's grounds, of course. And I awaited the imminent arrival of the rest of my Sailor Team to the Palace's main courtyard, as well, for that matter.

Five minutes or so, at the very most, after they were all summoned, then, the remaining members of my Team of Sailors and Knights all arrived there. Even though some of them had then been asleep as was usually the case for them in their lives, for whatever reason or reasons they might possibly be in them, they all still did so now, just the same.

Mother quickly briefed them on the currently-developing Abigail and Sailor Weikobi-related situation. And at least a few of the other members of my Sailor Team were not very happy with either of them here. Most especially the ones who'd just been asleep in their respective chambers. Theo hadn't actually been one of them. But Adam of House Garland from Igekaxou had been. And so had been Matthew of House Jackson from Esperus, and at least two others, for that matter, here.

Theo then divided the now-present Knights into teams of two or three Knights each here. The other Knights then present with us all here now formed teams as he chose to divide them up. One team of Knights was Knight Zachary of Batosku and Adam of Igekaxou. A second team was Knight Heaven of Eternium, Knight Chad of Cyanon, and Knight Matthew of Esperus. A third team was Knight Myron of Terron and Knight Henry of Hadron. Theo paired up with Knight Sheldon from Kilakogo to form a fourth team. And the fifth team was Knight Randolph of Padorphu and Knight Mallory of Weikobi. He gave the necessary orders to the rest of the Knights here, before all eleven Knights then began to do as they'd then need to do here. He briefly shot me a rather unhappy look just before he and the other Knights then left the rest of us behind to a sufficient enough degree here, of course.

I nodded back at him, as he and the other Knights were then leaving, and he then acknowledged that nod before turning away from me again here. After all our Knights were gone from here well enough, I then split up the remaining Sailors with me here as I saw fit. For my two current teammates on Team One, I chose Thora of Esperus and Destiny of Terron, even though Thora and I didn't normally get along very well with Destiny. I needed to know at least a bit more about Abigail's potential actions than I needed to fight with Destiny right now, however. Destiny had still been known to periodically have somewhat accurate visions of potential future events, though, no matter what they were, and no matter how much I might think otherwise. So I rather reluctantly indeed selected her for my current team here. I chose for Team Two Colleen of Batosku, Jeralen of Selonagi, and Ariel of Eternium, for Ariel could often fly whenever she was powered up as Sailor Eternium. And I needed someone who could normally fly well enough in the air so as to hopefully better be able to spot Abigail, even as she climbed in the nearby mountains to where Setakonai Heights was in our Kingdom, on at least one team, if not more than one, of course. That then left, by logical enough extension here, Melody of Cyanon, Flora of Igekaxou, and Sage of Hadron to form Team Three with each other here. With the teams assigned as already stated here, all three of our teams then quite quickly indeed moved out in search of both Sailor Weikobi and Abigail.

It took most of us, though not all of us, at least several hours both to locate and to actually contain both Sailors Weikobi and Padorphu sufficiently well, if not even longer than that, in fact. Especially after Sailor Weikobi had eventually caused Abigail to power up into her own Sailor state of being as well to become Sailor Padorphu just about an hour or two, at most, after I'd then summoned the rest of my Sailor Team. I'd done this so that we could all follow Mother's orders both to try and find and to try and restrain them well enough here. As we all tried to locate and to contain both of them sufficiently well, we periodically saw much damage and much destruction in their respective wakes which we couldn't obviously attend to here at the present time, even if we really wanted to do so now. First we all quite obviously had to find and restrain them both well enough, of course. And with them both currently powered up into their respective Sailor states of being, that wasn't normally very easy for us to do. And especially whenever they didn't actually want to be found or to be restrained by anyone at all in their respective lives.

Eventually, though, both of them had exhausted themselves at least enough for us to find and swoop down on them before they could both stop us from doing so well enough. When we then found them both somewhat near each other, they were both just outside the city limits of Setakonai Heights, after Weikobi had eventually drawn Padorphu out of her current hiding place by temporarily unleashing a sickness against several of the nearby plants and animals, so as to better battle her for a while. It wasn't actually a sickness that would necessarily kill those plants or animals. But Padorphu didn't know that well enough, or at least not at the current time. So she quickly came out of her hiding place to battle against Weikobi for at least a little while, if not a long while.

Both soon fought each other using any and all non-lethal means that were then at their disposal. And both of them fought essentially to a draw, more or less, before eventually finding it currently impossible for them to continue doing so well enough. When we found them both, they were both lying semi-conscious and out of their respective Sailor states of being just about thirty yards from each other, in a small forest clearing near Setakonai Heights.

It then took us just about an hour or so for us all to return to the Starmoon Palace in Enterprise, once we found and restrained them both well enough. The Palace's grounds had been at least somewhat damaged by Abigail and Sailor Weikobi while they were both still on them. And when we came back with both Renee and Abigail, all the damage they'd caused on the Palace's grounds had not yet been repaired well enough, if it ever would be.

Mother soon had us bring both Abigail and Renee to the Palace's Main Medical Ward for a while, and then she had Renee's mother and several others begin treating them both as needed at the current time. After that was done well enough here, she then asked us all to report on our time searching for them both and on the time that we all spent in containing them well enough. So we all did so, without any argument at all about it, for all the obvious reasons here. Eventually, she ordered us all to Destiny's chambers so that we could all then go to Terron as she'd earlier told us we'd all have to go this morning. By the time we all got there, thanks to some rather good medical treatment from Renee's mother and several other people, Renee and Abigail were both already waiting for us there. Not more than five or so minutes, then, after we all got to Destiny's chambers, we were all on Terron quite near the Hall of Ages that Mother had mentioned earlier to several of us this morning.

We all talked rather briefly with several of the Terron-based Rangers there, who were part of another branch of our solar system's armed forces. And then we all entered the Hall of Ages with Destiny and Myron both leading us all into them as needed here. We soon came to a specific part of it where many scrolls and many other items were then often kept. Destiny and Myron soon picked up a few dozen of them or so, and eventually they passed them around to the rest of us, before they then touched at least a few full-length mirrors on a nearby wall to us all.

As they did so, assorted moving figures in assorted numbers appeared on them all periodically, showing assorted scenes of various events. Whether or not they were actually events incontrovertibly known to already have happened on various worlds in our very own solar system, those mirrors showed those assorted events quite often indeed for at least a little while, if not for a long while. Some of those very same mirrors even showed certain events that may have actually happened already on certain other worlds that we now knew of well enough in our respective mortal lives. After we all watched the aforementioned events for at least a little while in all of the necessary mirrors in the Hall of Ages, Destiny and Myron soon directed our various attentions to two other mirrors yet untouched by them here as they touched them here.

Destiny said, as she then touched one mirror, "This is our future in this system if we do all that we now need to do in it before they come." After she then touched it, the mirror almost immediately began to show potential future scenes of battle between us and assorted Negaverse-affiliated beings of various kinds, whether they were known or were unknown to us at the current time. We would still lose this particular battle, it seemed, according to the scenes being shown in that very same mirror. But supposedly, if we did all that we should then do, according to the potential future then being shown in the applicable mirror, we then would see many more of our people survive that battle than if we didn't do all that we should do here. I didn't believe that all these things would likely happen if we did what Destiny thought we should do, though. For that, the blame for what later transpired would largely, if not entirely, rest on me here, after the Negaverse eventually forced those of us who somehow managed to actually get off Kilakogo well enough to then do that in our lives.

After this rather imaginative aural and visual presentation of Destiny's here, which convinced at least a few of us that this potential future might be sufficiently achievable, she then had Myron touch the other aforementioned mirror that hadn't yet been touched by either of them here. As he did so, he then said, "This is our future in this system if we don't do all that we now need to do in it before they come." After he touched that mirror, it soon began to show certain other potential scenes of battle between us and the same, or nearly the same, kinds of beings that had been seen in the mirror that Destiny had touched earlier. As many of my fellow residents of this Palace had earlier suggested to me during our breakfasts this very morning, the events that were then shown in that particular mirror were much unlike the ones that had shown in Destiny's mirror. These events were much more likely, in my ultimate opinion, no matter what we did or didn't do in our very own solar system. And even if we did what Destiny and Myron thought we should do now in our solar system, in fact. When I eventually said that to the others then with me, many were not at all surprised at my current position on this particular matter in my life. They all really tried to convince me that Destiny's posited future was much more likely, if we then did what her mirror had actually suggested that we do. But I was still not quite sufficiently convinced by them all when they all then did so. I was quite immovable indeed on that sort of thing at the present time. And, for that very reason, certain major negative events that shouldn't have ever happened at all on or around Kilakogo, at least, eventually did, some length of time later, much to my eventual regret. Many more people from our own solar system would now most certainly die later on who could possibly have been saved from death had I listened sufficiently well here. And had I then done what I should've actually done before our Negaverse enemies had even come to Kilakogo in the first place. I somehow actually convinced at least enough people who were near me then of my own current position or positions on the necessary matter or matters here to at least some degree, if not to a great degree. This was a quite colossal mistake of mine which ultimately led to the loss of many more sentient beings than should've actually been lost later on in our own solar system. As I'd later come to realize, many long years later, sometime after my eventual re-initiation as Sailor Kilakogo.

After we each had viewed and handled all the necessary items here for at least a little while, then, we all soon spent about an hour or so in various other areas of the Hall of Ages, before we quite naturally enough had to leave them behind again here. And leave them behind again for whatever reason or reasons we had to do so in our respective lives. We rather quickly made a short trip or two to the two Palaces that belonged to Destiny and Myron's families on Terron, before we finally left Terron behind again for the very last time somewhat near the Hall of Ages. We wouldn't actually see those same Rangers again for at least a thousand Terran years, if ever again, in fact.

Not too much later, then, we all eventually returned with each other to Destiny's very own Starmoon Palace chambers. And many of us were still disagreeing with each other, to at least some degree here, when we then did so, about certain things that we'd all just seen and just heard while still on Terron with each other, for that matter. This was the case here for all the obvious reasons, of course.

Colleen still really thought I was going to be the cause of many people's potentially avoidable deaths. And she'd ultimately prove to be sufficiently right here. Had I actually listened to her this time here, and had I actually done what she and others thought I should've done before our enemies finally made Moonfall on Kilakogo, we might then have been able to save a lot more inhabitants from all our various kingdoms in our own solar system. But, as I said earlier, I didn't actually do so well enough to somehow prevent the events that ultimately would now take place when they finally came to Kilakogo as many people had thought they would come to it.

Instead, after we all got back to Kilakogo, and we all eventually began leaving Destiny's chambers for the rest of the current night, Theo and I eventually went for a walk later on in the Moon Garden somewhat near Enterprise's Starmoon Palace for at least a while, if not for a long while. We both went for a rather private walk with each other then, when we should've actually begun to do what we possibly could then do in order to make sure others were sufficiently safe from future harm later on after the Negaverse came here as they later would.

We stayed with each other, then, until about 1:15 in the morning local time, at the very latest. He eventually dropped me off outside my Starmoon Palace chambers with a brief kiss or two near my rooms' outermost doors. And I soon entered my own chambers for the rest of the overnight period here. As I then dressed for bed, a mostly silver, black, and copper-coated cat with a medium-sized gold circle on its forehead entered my bathroom, and soon perched on the edge of a nearby water basin. The cat was a female one, and she was now just about three or four Terran years old, more or less. She was just one of my Guardians, and she would later be one of them, at least once more, as I'd later learn sometime yet in the future. Her name was Pakushai, in fact. And she was the only known survivor of her own parents' offspring after all eleven of her siblings had been lost not long after their respective births during a certain diplomatic trip that my maternal grandparents had taken to another solar system. For my maternal grandparents had gone on a diplomatic trip to another solar system in rather fervent hopes of making it much more likely that our people would survive the future well enough. Even if the prophecies that I'd just disbelieved actually proved to be sufficiently accurate in their respective natures. However, they never returned to Kilakogo after their mission to another solar system. For their ship eventually exploded after an entirely-unexpected battle against many rather well-armed pirates from a solar system that was quite near the one they'd just gone to on that diplomatic trip of theirs. Their interstellar primarily diplomacy-oriented courier ship ultimately was not sufficiently capable of defending itself against those very same pirates. Especially after it had secretly been sabotaged by assorted terrorists in the system they'd just gone to on that same diplomatic trip of theirs. When their ship was lost, everything and everyone that was then on it was unquestionably lost too, quite naturally enough. We only learned of their ultimate fate several long months later, after certain other beings that we were in somewhat regular contact with eventually learned of it and its ultimate fate. After which, they then told us of it and its ultimate fate well enough, just as soon as they possibly could do so well enough, of course. Mother was quite inconsolable for quite a while, quite obviously enough.

After I then dressed for bed quite well enough here, Pakushai finally spoke to me here. She said, "Faith, you seem to be rather skeptical about many things of late. I hope that your skepticism doesn't get many of us killed by our enemies from the Negaverse."

"I don't believe we have as much to be concerned about in relation to them as the Dreamers would have us believe that we should be, Pakushai. If I'm wrong, though, so be it. But I will not let the Dreamers dictate how I and others should live our respective lives, if I can possibly ever avoid it at all. No matter what."

"I see. Well, I hope you're right, of course, but I really don't think you are, at least this time, Faith."

"You're supposed to agree with me, Pakushai, not take the Dreamers' side of things here, I think."

"No, I don't believe so. I'm supposed to be your Guardian. Which means I have to do whatever I possibly can to look out for you, no matter what it is, in my life and in yours, at least. Even if it might actually be quite a bit different than what you might have me do here, I must still do whatever I possibly can to see to your safety and to the safeties of those who are sufficiently around you now in your life. I'm not supposed to just support everything you'd rather have me support in my own life, Faith. Otherwise, I wouldn't be the Guardian I should actually be for you, I'm quite sure, in your own life."

We talked for a little while longer, before I retired to my bed, and she to hers near mine, and fell asleep. We each soon were quite soundly asleep again in our respective beds. And we didn't rise again from them until sometime near 8:30 in the morning, at the very earliest. And by 9:15 in the morning, at the very latest. After we got up and did whatever we normally did before exiting our chambers again on a typical Kilakogon day, we soon found out that my father, my brother, and many other people had arrived on the Palace's grounds from assorted areas elsewhere in our system. My father was King Torga, and my brother was Prince Tayoto. My brother was younger than me, so he was not the current legal heir to the throne of Kilakogo after my parents. I was legally next in the line of succession to it. And perhaps, just because of that fact, I was so certain that we'd be able to survive well enough any potential Negaverse invasion of Kilakogo, at least, if not elsewhere in our system as well. And perhaps even beat them quite easily enough in battle ultimately, in our own solar system. Yet, these beliefs of mine still led to the deaths of many who could possibly have been saved somehow.

When Father heard about the events of the previous day, he wasn't very happy indeed. And he said so, but not as strongly as Mother might have done, for he was more the kind of man who wasn't generally given to strong words and actions whenever he didn't have to be. Sure, he could be quite firm whenever he absolutely needed to be in his life. But Mother would generally be the disciplinarian in our family instead of him. For he was often away on solar system-related business for our various worlds and for Selonagi, often as an ambassador or helper of sorts to them from Kilakogo. I could generally get away with a good deal more of my habits with him present than I could without him around at a particular time, in fact. Publicly, Mother was the one who most commonly spoke for and ran our Kingdom. But privately, at least occasionally, Father would determine our family's course of actions in life, if and whenever it was possible for him to do just that. Not all the time, mind you. For my mother was often bound and determined that certain things should go as she thought they should in life. But often enough that he was able to exert at least some control over our family if and whenever our current circumstances made it possible for him to do just that.

For instance, Mother was not too keen on the fact that Theo and I had fallen in love with each other after having occasionally met each other during assorted solar system-related meetings between inhabitants of our solar system about five Terran years or so before the present day. Father was quite keen on the idea, once we finally made him aware of that fact on my thirteenth birthday, in terms of Terran reckoning of calendar years, at a system-wide major formal occasion meant to celebrate my full initiation into the Sailor Corps and into certain Kingdom-related matters. Matters such as the matter of my Junior Planetary Court, for example. Mother opposed the idea, but Father put his foot down, for once, and forced Mother to let us spend considerable amounts of time together in our lives, if and whenever possible in them. For she would have rather seen me with another young man from Kilakogo at least as my chief suitor, if not also as my future husband, in fact.

"Faith, you must not unnecessarily cause trouble here for us, if it can be avoided at all. Many are going to die now, and perhaps many more will die now that could possibly have been saved if you'd just heeded your friends and fellow Sailor Team members' warnings, as I'm reasonably sure that you won't. I just hope that your actions don't ultimately mean that our worlds and our star will never have sufficient amounts of sentient life again, if things turn out as I'm strongly suspecting that they now will."

"Beloved Father, several of them made their arguments for certain actions that we should undertake now almost quite convincing, I must admit. But their respective arguments were not quite convincing enough for me to agree with them well enough here and now. Many more of our system's various inhabitants may now die that could possibly have been saved. And if that's true, then so be it. But I'll most certainly not let certain people largely, if not entirely, dictate just how I might ever live my own life anywhere, and at any time, at all in this Universe of ours. No matter where it might ever be, if I can possibly ever avoid it, I won't let them do so at all, by the way. And most especially not the Dreamers, in fact."

"As you wish, Faith. But for once, at least, I can't totally agree with your current thoughts on this particular matter here, if not any others as well here. Do what you feel you must now do, but please do know this. If certain things ultimately do turn out as many of our people now seem to think that they might here, then it'll most likely be largely, if not entirely, your own fault that they ultimately turned out as they did around here. Will you actually be able to then live with yourself, somehow, if and when you ever realize that you could possibly have done more to save the inhabitants from all our worlds and our star before our enemies came here, then?"

"If I have to, I think I'll be able to do that well enough. It may not be very easy at all, mind you. But I still think that I can do that well enough, if the need ever arises, in the future, Beloved Father." We talked for a while longer, before I eventually found Tayoto elsewhere on the Palace's grounds, playing a chess-like game with several of his friends in a game room of sorts.

My brother Tayoto was now actually about twelve Terran years old, more or less. But he generally looked about two or three such years older than that now in his life. He was now just a shade both shorter and lighter than I now was in my own life. And he had the first hints of a blond beard and moustache starting to appear on his face. His round eyes were as green as emeralds, not bright blue like my own. Where his blond hair was rather short and rather straight, my own blonde hair was largely long and wavy, and often worn in well-woven braids that wound around my head above my forehead and ears like a coiled Terran snake might often rest on the ground while resting. Tayoto had a short diagonal scar running just below his left eye from the outside corner of it to about halfway to the nearest corner of his mouth on his left cheek, from when he'd quite accidentally been hit by a knife thrown by a random stranger hunting for small game near the Palace while he'd also been doing the same thing, several Terran years before the present time.

I watched him play that game for a while with his then-present friends, and after they eventually left him, I asked him, "Tell me where you and Beloved Father went most recently. Honored Mother neglected to inform me of where you were going, Tayoto."

Tayoto said, "We went to try to help various inhabitants escape the coming invasion of the Negaverse in the Hadron, Weikobi, Eternium, Terron, and Esperus mini-systems, at least, Treasured Sister. We couldn't actually rescue everyone, though, for we only had a certain number of ships with us at the time. More ships full of evacuees are due to arrive here at Kilakogo sometime later on, whether it's today or tomorrow. The Rangers in those planets' mini-systems are doing what they can to buy our worlds more time to evacuate themselves and their inhabitants to here, but it still won't be enough to save everyone. The situation out in the outer reaches of this system is worsening very fast indeed, and it won't get better anytime soon. We ourselves were only barely able to get out of the Esperusan mini-system before the Negaverse destroyed several dozen ships and/or space stations in it. Others were going to try to get away from there not long after we left it as well, for that matter."

"I see. What else, Tayoto?" We eventually moved to his chambers in the Palace, and he soon began to collect assorted things of his on several carts and things then present in them. His chambers were quite well-organized and quite neat in their nature, in all parts of them, in fact. Much unlike my own, by the way, which were often rather cluttered and rather disorganized, often to the great dismay of my mother.

"We have absolutely no chance at successfully withstanding their coming invasion of Kilakogo. Especially once they get control over enough of the inhabitants of other worlds in our system that they don't yet have control over well enough. I humbly recommend, Treasured Sister, then, that you soon begin to prepare your Team for the battle which is certain to come sometime tomorrow, at the very latest. Or that you soon should help any number of other people prepare our evacuation ships for departure to a yet-undisclosed solar system that our Honored Mother will designate closer to the expected time that our Negaverse enemies will make Moonfall here on Kilakogo. You quite evidently have chosen now to largely, if not entirely, disregard the recommendations of many of your Sailor Team's members. So our ultimate fates for when they finally come here to Kilakogo may now be quite sealed. I hope that isn't really the case for us all here and now, of course, but it now seems that it very well might be."

"And if I don't do either of those things, then what, Tayoto? Will you tell on me to Beloved Father or to Honored Mother, or not?" I asked, as he very carefully took down a painting in oils that he'd made just about a Terran year ago, more or less, of several of his rather close friends, and placed it in a certain good-sized metal chest of his.

"No, Treasured Sister, I won't. But I still will leave you with these thoughts of mine here. This course of events might just lead to much more tragedy that could possibly have been avoided by us all. And if anyone survives them well enough, your name may not be regarded very well indeed. At least not among many other people in this solar system and/or this Universe of ours some unknown length of time in the future, anyway. Supposing, of course, that they actually might ever learn of any or all of them well enough in the future, somehow." Several other items of assorted sizes and shapes joined that painting of his friends in that good-sized chest of his in rather short order.

"If that is the case, then so be it, Tayoto. If it means my name is eventually regarded rather poorly indeed by most, if not all, future historians in this solar system, this Galaxy, and/or this Universe of ours in the future, I think I can actually live with that fact well enough, somehow. I will let history unfold as it may, in regards to me. But I will not just let certain Dreamers tell me what I can and can't do in my life, if I can possibly ever avoid it at all in it, somehow."

"Noted, Treasured Sister. But I still think you'll be making a big mistake if you don't do what you can to help everyone out as much as you can here while you still have at least some chance to do that somehow." He eventually closed the chest with the picture of his friends in it, and locked it, before continuing to move periodically around his chambers so that he could collect other things of his quite well enough here.

"It will be my mistake to make, then, Tayoto. I'll accept any and all necessary blame for my actions, then, in that case. But I really don't think things will be quite as bad as many people think that they might now be here. Even if our Negaverse enemies come as forcefully as many might seem to think that they will to here." He eventually finished gathering up any number of things in his chambers, before sitting down briefly on his bed, which now had its covers completely off them. For they'd already been placed in still another storage container of some sort while he and many other people had been off Kilakogo most recently in their lives by several servants here on the Palace's grounds.

I asked him why he'd stopped gathering more of his things here, and he soon told me, "Treasured Sister, our ships can only hold a certain amount of people's personal cargo on each of them. What I have packed, or had packed for me, will fill up my weight allowance quite well, if not entirely. I have collected, or had collected for me, everything that I most want to keep in my life, if at all possible. Even if I could actually have many more items saved from here or elsewhere in this solar system, at least, I don't necessarily think they really need to be saved from potential loss due to our enemies' actions or due to any number of other circumstances that might ever arise for any of us here in this solar system, at least."

"I see. So you don't want to keep any more of your sculptures, for instance?" I asked him, thinking that several of them were potentially worth being kept here, if at all possible.

"No, I don't. They would overload at least one ship, I think, if they were taken on board them. If they're left, more people might actually survive than if they weren't, for instance. Besides, some of them are immovable, or nearly so, under normal enough circumstances, Treasured Sister. Because that is the case, I am more than willing to take the chance that they might ultimately be damaged or destroyed when our enemies come here."

"Very well, but I still don't agree with your idea that several of your sculptures should stay here from now on, just the same, Tayoto."

"That is your right, of course, in your own life, Treasured Sister. Now, if I might actually make a humble suggestion here, I think it most certainly would be best for all of us here in this solar system if you'd then do as I recommended to you not long ago here and elsewhere. All while also rather seriously considering the fact that you've quite obviously set us now on a particular course of actions that may not be sufficiently changeable now. Whether it's to prepare your Sailor Team for eventual battle or to help prepare our evacuation ships for eventual departure from Kilakogo tomorrow, I humbly suggest that you do one of those two things, if not both of them, today while you still can. Our Negaverse enemies will most certainly be here sometime tomorrow. And when they do finally manage to get here quite well enough, then your chance to do either of those things, if not both of them, will be gone here once and for all, at least in this solar system, I'm quite sure."

"Noted. Anything else?"

"No, not at the moment, Treasured Sister. May I now have my privacy, for I think I still have some things I wish to do alone before the end comes here for all of us now on Kilakogo?"

"Permission granted for you to have that privacy, Tayoto."

"Thank you, Treasured Sister. Please try to remember all that I've just discussed with you here, then, today, if at all possible."

"Of course, Tayoto."

I soon left my brother's chambers in the Starmoon Palace behind, and eventually moved to my own for at least a little while, if not a long while. But only after first going to the Palace's main dining hall to get at least something for my own breakfast here, of course. When I then got there, Melody was sitting near her sweetheart Chad of House Meredith on Cyanon. Unlike her or me, however, he had considerably darker skin than we both did, and considerably darker skin than many of the other members of my own Sailor Team. Most of my Team consisted of somewhat light-skinned people. But there were still at least a few darker-skinned members of it, just the same. Abigail and Chad, for instance, were such members of it. And so were Randolph, Jeralen, Henry, and Myron, for that matter. Sage looked almost Terran East Asian, and Heaven looked at least a little bit Terran East Asian as well. Other than Chad, Randolph, Abigail, Jeralen, Henry, Myron, Sage, and Heaven, then, the rest of us were generally rather light-skinned in our respective skin tones.

When Melody and Chad eventually saw me, Melody soon said, "Hello, Faith. Did you have a rather good time with Theo last night after our trip to Terron?"

"It was fine, at the very least, if not even better than that. I hope that we actually can be together one day as husband and wife, though, of course. But many may not like the idea much of us being that way for each other in our lives. I know you don't think very highly at all of him, Melody. But I can't even imagine possibly ever being married to anyone else at all in my life. He makes me feel quite wonderful indeed! At least most of the time, in fact."

"I see, Faith. And if I told you that I might feel for Chad the way you do about Theo, would you think it a good match for me in my life?" She asked me this as I sat down near her and Chad, in fact.

"It's your life, Melody. I can't tell you who you can love in it. Even if I might or might not necessarily think him the best potential mate for you in it. I don't have that right, I believe, for the simple reasons being that I'm not even from your own world in this solar system of ours, and that I 'm also not now in a position to veto any potential future match between you and him. I have absolutely no say at all about who you can possibly marry in your life yet, if I ever will have a chance to have a say about such things in it."

The three of us conversed periodically with each other as we had our respective breakfasts in the main dining hall. Even after several other people eventually joined us as well in it, we still did so, this morning. Among the things that we discussed with each other here were my earlier conversation with Tayoto, for instance. Melody thought it rather wise advice of my brother's. And she soon enlisted me in helping her pack up several of her more important things in her own Starmoon Palace chambers, once we'd all finished our respective breakfasts in the Palace's main dining hall well enough. I helped her out to at least some considerable degree with her packing, of course. And then she had others in the Palace enlist me as well in their own preparations for either eventual battle or eventual departure from Kilakogo, much to my own surprise. I assisted several dozen people in such preparations before finally managing to retreat to my own Starmoon Palace chambers for at least a little bit of a breather in private.

However, I was eventually forced to let my mother, among many others, into my chambers. And I was soon forced either to begin packing, to have one last pre-battle preparation/training session with my Sailor Team, or to aid several other people at least a bit more in preparing our evacuation ships for eventual departure, once they came into my own Starmoon Palace chambers like they did.

I was unable to have much more time alone to myself in my chambers again until at least 10:30 at night, then, for many other people had required my attentions for much of the day, in fact. But, eventually, I did have that time here. By then, however, many, though not all, of my things had been cleaned up and/or packed either by me or by any number of other people then on the Palace's grounds. Whether I wanted them to be or not, they still were. I soon flopped down on my bed, and fell asleep for a while, in very short order.

All of a sudden, though, around local midnight, Pakushai charged into my chambers and jumped on me until I woke up well enough in my bed again. When I asked her what the matter was, she yelled, "Look out your windows, Faith! It is beginning, just as the prophecies and as many others in your life said that it might!" Still somewhat sleepily, then, I quickly arose from my bed to see a most unusual sight. That most unusual sight was the sight of all our system's currently-visible and still-inhabitable worlds quickly aligning in a perfectly straight line with each other and with Selonagi, in fact. Granted, I wasn't actually able to see all of our system's inhabited worlds and our system's star at the present time from where I was now on Kilakogo. But there now was an extremely strong force that was beginning to assert itself much more forcefully in our system. And not just because of the Negaverse's presence in it. It was so strong, in fact, that it seemed to begin to freeze all the aforementioned stars in place, completing that sort of feat by local midnight here on Kilakogo, somehow.

"Why are all these worlds and our star frozen in place now, Pakushai?" I soon asked, once I realized what had just happened well enough here.

"Because it is most certainly now the end of certain things here as we might each know of them now, Faith. By this time tomorrow, at the very latest, Kilakogo will most likely be devoid of most, if not all, known sentient life on or in it, it seems to me. You must now prepare yourself for eventual battle and for eventual departure from here, then. The time for just enjoying yourself on this world is now over. All our system's inhabited places have been essentially taken over by the Negaverse except for Kilakogo and maybe Selonagi, as far as I know here and now, in fact. They will make Moonfall by local dawn, from what I just heard from your mother, as well."

No more than about six hours, plus or minus fifteen minutes, at most, our enemies made Moonfall on Kilakogo, contrary to what I'd thought would happen. Not long after that, several nearby places to Enterprise were then placed under quite heavy attack by them. Several of them held out for several hours, but their defenders were unable to hold them at bay well enough to keep them from breaking through our lines of defense. Many brave and noble Rangers and other members of our kingdoms' armed forces fell on the fields of battle, and panic began to reign in the streets and along several of our kingdom's major highways leading to Enterprise, wherever our enemies then began to pummel our defenses down and wreak havoc in our kingdom.

In the meantime, while they were doing all that, Mother and her closest advisors were trying to find areas in and around Enterprise where we could hopefully hold them off for at least a little while longer at times, so as to better the chances that at least a few of our evacuation ships could get safely enough away from Kilakogo, if at all possible. And my Sailor Team and I were currently seeing to the loading of those ships with evacuees to the best of our abilities to do so. Even while many of us were not quite certain that they'd be able to get off Kilakogo in time, if and when the need arose for them to do so, on Mother's orders.

Eventually, though, the Negaverse's countless warriors found their respective ways to Enterprise and its city limits. Many would now die, and not just because of my inaction in certain things some time before. But when they did, they would die with true honor, unlike me, most likely, if I were to die here for a time on Kilakogo.

Many of our remaining warriors now lay in ambush waiting for the proper times to strike at our enemies. Even though they all knew they most likely would all die, or at least that all but a very rare few, if any, of them would do so before our enemies breached the outermost walls of our Starmoon Palace in Enterprise. Other than them, there were not many other warriors left for us to defend the Starmoon Palace and its grounds with, as I later found out, just before the final battle's end in Enterprise.

Mother and her advisors had our warriors who were then lying in ambush eventually spring their ambushes around six in the evening, local time. Many Negaverse warriors fell against our brave and noble warriors from all our worlds and our system's star, but not enough of those warriors fell in battle against our people to help us all out sufficiently well. The Negaverse could well afford those losses, but we couldn't, as I later learned, just before the end came to us here on Kilakogo. Or at least those of us who would also be killed in the final battle on the Palace's grounds, anyway.

Our warriors, however, somehow managed to buy us at least three more hours of breathing room, so to speak, before the last of them fell, and before the Negaverse continued inexorably towards our Starmoon Palace. Our first evacuation ships left Kilakogo's surface just after 9:05 pm local time, and quickly cloaked themselves from any Negaverse spacecraft that might be lurking about to the best of their abilities at the present time. All our ships of that nature generally could cloak in certain situations, and this kind of situation was one of those. They were somewhat lightly-armed, at least for the most part, so the ability to cloak was generally a must for them whenever possible.

Our enemies eventually reached the outermost walls of our Starmoon Palace at about 9:45 pm local time. Several short laser-like bursts later, there were then about eight rather large gaping holes in those walls of ours. Millions of Negaverse warriors of assorted kinds then flooded through our walls as if they were made merely of paper, not of several dozen feet of stone and/or metal, in fact. Ten thousand more of our warriors and/or civilians almost immediately met their ends when they did so. Most, if not all, of those civilians were members of our Palace's service staff, for that matter. The other civilians who were lost then were ones who then had failed to recognize the current danger in time to save their own lives easily enough, and they'd just been doing their own things without really paying attention to what was then going on now all over our kingdom, by the way.

I soon sent several hundred of our remaining Rangers who'd then made their ways towards me in the general direction of the Palace's western inner walls that our enemies had not yet breached sufficiently well. All of the other Rangers who were then near me and the rest of my Sailor Team, I told to hold the area around the remaining evacuation ships still on Kilakogo's surface to the best of their respective abilities until we got there well enough. For I was now going to take my Team to go find Mother and the rest of her closest advisors elsewhere on the Palace's grounds, if at all possible. They wished me much success in that attempt of mine, and I wished them the same. Though I knew quite well now that they most certainly would die with much more honor and glory to their respective names if and when they fell than I would if I did so here before I got off this once-lovely world of mine well enough.

Those who I sent to the Palace's western inner walls would most certainly fall. But they wouldn't actually fall on or around them without somehow delaying our enemies from their ultimate goals for at least another hour or so, as I'd later come to learn. Those ultimate goals of theirs included, in fact, the possession and the control of all our Planetary Court Crystals, as Colleen had earlier suggested to me at least once before. But also complete and permanent control over everyone and everything, not only in our solar system, but everyone and everything in any other known part of our Universe, for that matter. Without the enough, if not all, of the aforementioned Crystals, though, they'd never be able to do that well enough, most likely.

While our Rangers sent to the Palace's western inner walls were delaying our enemies' advance through them, then, I led my team to where I knew my mother would still be with her closest advisors. I quickly reported the current events on the battle as well as I knew of them so far. She thanked me for my report, and then she said, "We won't have too much time left, then, everyone. It is time for us to prepare to execute 'Operation Vengeance,' it seems to me. Sailor Kilakogo, you and your Sailor Team are now to begin retreating to the area where the last evacuation ships are. Gather up all remaining civilians that you possibly can, and get them aboard those ships to the best of your abilities to do so. Then once that is done as best as you possibly can do just that, protect all of those remaining ships at least until we can relieve you of that duty well enough. We will be there with you just as soon as we can, then. No debate! Is that crystal clear?"

"Perfectly, Honored Mother. I hope you know what you're doing, for I really don't know about 'Operation Vengeance' at all right now, if I ever will."

"I do know what we're going to do, no matter what it takes. You do not yet need to know about Operation Vengeance, if you ever will need to know about it in your life. Now go, while you still can, Sailor Kilakogo and all!"

So we left Mother and her closest advisors behind where they now were in what was still left of our Palace. And we all began to carry out her orders here as best as we could, then, even after the Rangers I'd sent to the Palace's western inner walls eventually fell in battle against our enemies. We all made it to where the evacuation ships were still loading and/or leaving Kilakogo's surface periodically. And we all defended the general area around them all to the very best of our respective abilities at the current time in our lives. Even as they continued to load on or leave from Kilakogo's surface as the need arose for them to do just that. Eventually, there was just one ship left on Kilakogo's surface, and that would be our evacuation ships' convoy flagship, in fact. We waited a bit longer for our parents, and held the area as best as we could around it, then, hoping that they too would be able to make it aboard that same ship as well. Our parents eventually appeared in front of us, although they were now fighting for their very lives and the lives of all of us, as I later learned here, once we'd left our system and landed elsewhere in the Galaxy well enough.

Many of them had at least twenty to thirty Terran years of fighting experience in their lives, if not even more than that. They were all generally quite good at fighting in their respective lives. But not even they, the ones who had maintained our system's inhabited places even in other times of conflict between us and several other solar systems' peoples, would be able to withstand sheer force of Negaverse warriors' numbers under the current circumstances. As we all would soon come to realize as my Sailor Team and I watched them still continue to battle our enemies even all the way to within three feet or so of our positions near the last ship here on Kilakogo, in fact.

When many of the Negaverse's warriors then got within about three feet of where we now were, our parents all said, "No further will you monsters all go against us, if we all can possibly help it. You will not claim our own children's lives for your own." We all began feeling assorted items being tossed behind us or into our hands, no matter what they were. Some of those things were crystals, and some were other things we didn't yet have enough time to examine here, at least, for all the obvious reasons.

Our parents held back their opponents as best as they could while those items were being passed to us or sent past us into that last evacuation ship of ours here. When they eventually stopped doing so here, though, I then asked, "Honored Mother, are you all coming along with us now?"

"No, we won't, Faith. We must remain here, so that you and your many associates and many civilians can escape here. We love you all very much, even if you are all rather troublesome at times in your lives. We also will not be able to hold onto our Crystals any longer in our lives. Our time is nearly over here. If it is God's will, we will eventually meet each other again in the future, somehow. But, for now, at least, you must all part from us in your lives. Do not let our enemies get our Crystals, no matter what, if you possibly can do just that. If they do, any world's Crystals that they can control most certainly will be used for evil purposes, not good ones. You must hold a world's Crystal or Crystals for it to be sufficiently restorable later, when the time for their eventual restoration comes to pass. Go, and go now. We will not be able to hold them back much longer. Take care of everyone to the best of your ability, even if you don't generally get along with them very well at all, then, Wild One."

"Understood, Honored Mother. May we meet again, then, if at all possible, in the future. I'm truly sorry for all the trouble that I have now caused for us all here on Kilakogo! I should've listened to everyone who told me that these things would happen for us all!"

"You can't deny your heart's leadings, Wild One. This situation was perhaps unavoidable from your own birth, come to think of it. But, hopefully, in the future, you all can actually change things at least enough so that if our worlds are somehow fully restored to the ways that they should be, this sort of thing will never again come to pass in this system of ours."

"Understood, Honored Mother."

"We will always be with you all, then, no matter what happens, Faith, at least as long as you all live well enough, for sure. Now you must depart. Say hello to Queen Serenity when you see her next, Wild One. Tell everyone that they are to depart for the Sol System as soon as possible, then. The Sol System, and only the Sol System, if at all possible. Do I make myself quite crystal clear?"

"Yes, Honored Mother. The Sol System, and only the Sol System, if at all possible."

"Good. Now go! And may you all fare quite well enough in the future, then, God willing, Wild One," Mother said, just before she and Father suddenly closed our ship's main hatch right in front of me without any prior warning to that effect. Ten seconds later, then, our ship left the ground, and began to rise faster and faster as even more time passed for all of us here. Below us, Mother and the rest of our parents bought us even more time to get away until we were sufficiently high up in the skies above Enterprise. When we finally were, all of them were quite closely crammed together back-to-back as best as they then could be. About 50,000 Negaverse warriors and/or their surviving leaders now surrounded them all as they all prepared for their now-certain deaths. Our parents were then wielding swords of various kinds and shields of the appropriate enough kinds for themselves. Even though they all knew they were doomed to die where they now were in very short order. The overall leaders of the Negaverse's forces, who many of us would later come to know as Queen Beryl, and Generals Jadeite, Nephlyte, Zoisite, and Malachite offered them all their lives for their Planetary Court Crystals and ours. But Mother and her fellow monarchs in our solar system all, rather boldly indeed, said, at the exact same instant, "Never will we let such vile beings as yourselves get our Crystals or those of our children, no matter what, if we can possibly ever avoid it at all. If you want them, you'll have to find them yourselves, and take them from their possessors by force, without a doubt. Kill us, if you must, but you will never get possession of them if our surviving people can possibly ever avoid it at all in this Universe of ours."

Needless to say, those things didn't sit very well at all, of course, with Queen Beryl and her Generals. Moments later, then, Queen Beryl suddenly motioned towards the waiting Negaverse warriors around our parents, and they charged. Our parents defended themselves quite well, but not well enough to ultimately save their lives where they now were. As they began to die from any number of mortal wounds, then, they all suddenly cried out, with their last breaths on Kilakogo's surface, "Cosmic Ranger Vengeance Power!" Ten seconds later, at most, then, they all died simultaneously, all the still-remaining Negaverse warriors or leaders other than Queen Beryl and her Generals were atomized completely, and all our evacuation ships were quite unexpectedly forced completely away from Kilakogo by some yet-unknown means. Just before we were all quite suddenly forced away from Kilakogo, I then caught a very brief glance of the Starmoon Palace as the rest of it crumbled almost completely near what little was still left of all our parents who'd just atomized all but a very rare few of the remaining Negaverse-affiliated beings still on Kilakogo. And I also saw Queen Beryl and her four Generals only barely escaping the aforementioned atomization of their warriors by opening a portal of some sort to some yet-unfamiliar area of the Universe to us. They'd not be so easily destroyed, as we all would eventually learn, after they would eventually come to the Moon intending to do there what they'd intended to do to all our system's Kingdoms.

We were all gone from the immediate area of Kilakogo by midnight local time on the date that Terrans would most likely reckon as June 26, 989. We all then spent no more than two or three days traveling to the Sol System, and we arrived at its outermost edge by what would have been noon Enterprise time on June 29, 989. We were detained briefly there by assorted Moon Kingdom spacecraft, for all the obvious reasons, before eventually being permitted entry into the Sol System on the direct orders of Queen Serenity herself. Several of our evacuation ships hadn't really weathered the trip from the Selonagi system very well. That was due to them having taken at least some damage before they'd actually been able to leave Kilakogo's surface well enough, and in a few cases, even after leaving it, of course. But they were all still holding together to at least some degree, if not totally, somehow.

All of our ships eventually landed quite near each other in the general area of Moon City on the Moon. And those of us who had somehow managed to survive the trip from our system well enough were soon checked out as best as possible, of course. While the others who'd not actually done so well enough were soon laid to rest as needed in certain Moon City-area burial grounds or other areas where the dead would often rest anywhere at all on the Moon, quite naturally enough.

After all the necessary things had been taken care of as needed here, then, the Moon Kingdom granted us refugee status in the Moon Kingdom, and we remained in the Sol System at least until such time as the Moon Kingdom ultimately fell because of our mutual enemies' invasion of it. Those of us who were still left eventually fell in battle against them. Even me, by the way. But just before we'd have been consigned to permanent death along with so many others, Queen Serenity then sent each and every single one of us at least enough energy somehow to actually ensure our ultimate survival into the future. We were all soon encased in assorted stasis containers of various kinds, and sent to the future by her. But it was at the cost of her own life that she did so, in fact. We would be sent to a yet-unknown time in the future, and we would hopefully be able to live our lives at least once more, in a much more peaceful time.

But such peace wouldn't last forever, as we'd later come to realize, once old enemies reawakened and new ones arose as well to oppose us, in due time. Our time in the past was now over, and our future was yet to be experienced, once we were then sent to it. Only the Holy Ones knew then what would eventually come to pass for us in it, though. So ended the Sapphire Age of Selonagi.


	2. Chapter One: The First Sailor Misfit

All the necessary disclaimers are present here before this story's Prologue begins. If you have any questions about whether or not I'm actually claiming certain things as my very own here, please refer to the Prologue for such information, everyone. Those disclaimers will hereby be effective as might then be appropriate not only for this particular story, but also for any other potential sequels that might spring from it in due time, for that matter. This will most likely be the only time I'll mention this particular fact here, or nearly the only time here, so as to hopefully not take too much of your rather valuable time away from your reading of this story here, if I can then actually avoid it somehow here, somehow. I really hope that you'll all greatly enjoy this chapter and any others that may eventually follow it later here, of course. Without any further ado, then, let's get back to the story, and away we go!

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Chapter One: The First Sailor Misfit Awakens From Her Dormancy!

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It all began anew for me with a series of rather piercing gazes from a pair of big black cat eyes. Little did I yet know this, but those eyes would draw me into adventures I'd never even expected any eyes to draw me into in my life. And those eyes' owner would come to eventually re-acquaint me both with several old friends and with many old enemies from a long-forgotten past.

Those big black cat eyes were almost as black as midnight often was on Earth. And they belonged to a multi-colored female cat with a rather strange marking of some sort on her forehead. A rather strange marking which I couldn't recall when I first encountered her, but which I would, once my new adventures had begun well enough in my life. This rather strange marking was a medium-sized gold circle on her forehead. And she was a mostly silver, black, and copper-coated cat who then seemed to be about three or four Terran years of age in her life.

I really didn't expect to see her one afternoon near a city park in the small Minnesotan town of Acadria that I now live in. But as I was still passing by Tribune Park on my way home from what had been a slumber party at one of my friends' homes, I saw her treed in one of the trees there by several dogs of assorted sizes and breeds. And those dogs were quite obviously not looking particularly friendly at her, either. She had this rather interesting look to herself, in fact. And I couldn't help but be somewhat unconsciously drawn to the scene. Especially after her big black cat eyes sent a series of rather piercing gazes my direction, once she'd somehow seen me well enough on a sidewalk near that city park.

As I neared the tree where she was then trapped by the dogs, I suddenly found myself quickly making up a good-sized number of snowballs even as I moved. I then unexpectedly found a few sticks or bits of rope near the park's entrance, and fashioned some improvised slings of a sort and a net of sorts to hold those snowballs in briefly. When I was then close enough to the tree to do so, I then began launching many snowballs at all those dogs until they all found themselves forced to withdraw from the tree they'd just been around. I didn't actually stop launching any number of snowballs at all those dogs until they'd all retreated far enough away from both me and the tree in which the cat had been trapped in, at the very earliest, then. After they all did so, I then found a ledge of some sort near the tree, and used it to get closer to her. The ledge allowed me access to the lower branches of the tree. Which I soon used to gain access to certain other branches in the tree. Eventually, after much careful moving by me from one branch to another in the tree, I reached the branch upon which the cat now sat. And she then leapt to my now-open hands rather unexpectedly. Just as carefully as I had now climbed up the tree, I came down it, until I was able to once again stand on the ledge near the tree. With that done, I soon leapt down to the ground below, cradling her in my arms in a rather protective manner, just in case I didn't land perfectly on the ground below as I hoped I would, of course.

When we were sufficiently on the ground again, she and I soon left the park behind here with each other. She rested in my arms calmly until we were about 1,500 yards from the park's entrance, and then suddenly leapt from my arms to the ground below. Not knowing why she did so, of course, I soon followed her, and she led me on what many would probably call a wild-goose chase for a while, until I truly met real battle for the very first time on Earth here.

First, though, you should all hear of how various things had gone for me the previous night at the slumber party that I mentioned earlier to all of you here, people. For it was a most unusual slumber party indeed, and one with many surprises that would lead to that adventure and many others, in due time. So let me now take you to the last night of true freedom in this life that I'd most likely have for quite some time, if not forever, everyone.

At Scarlett Oliver's Residence

Acadria, Minnesota, United States of America

December 31, 2007

I was at one of my close friends' houses with several other young girls ranging in ages from about eight years of age to about seventeen, more or less. I myself was then sixteen years old, as of August 18, 2007. We were all just about to begin a slumber party there, in fact. But first, all three of Scarlett Oliver's often-pesky brothers had to be accounted for and escorted either to their own bedrooms or to elsewhere in the Acadria area, for all the obvious reasons, of course.

Eventually, Scarlett's parents Dr. Thomas and Mrs. Sydney Oliver managed either to get them to their beds, or to get them to other places in the Acadria local area, before it was too late for them to do so here and now well enough. So, once we all learned that well enough, at about 8:30 pm local time, the aforementioned slumber party began for us all in Scarlett's own bedroom.

It began with some introductions between those who'd often been seen with me at such parties and those who hadn't, of course. For several of the attendees of this slumber party had never been to one that I'd previously been at, in fact. After all the necessary introductions were then made, Scarlett said, "Welcome, everyone, to my bedroom, and may we all have quite a bit of fun at this holiday slumber party of ours, if at all possible."

Scarlett was then about a year or two younger than I was. And she had a rather full head of hair that matched her name perfectly, as well. She was about 5'6" and about 130 pounds, more or less, without a doubt. Along one wall of her bedroom, there were pictures of assorted movie stars, for instance. Especially certain male ones from assorted foreign countries, in fact. She wore thin metal-rimmed glasses over her bright brown eyes. And she carried herself like someone who already knew what she really wanted out of life. Yet, there was still much many of us didn't know about her and her family, and especially about her parents, among many others we'd come to be rather well-acquainted with in our lives, if we weren't already. At the present time, though, we didn't know all these things here well enough, if we ever would.

Also at the slumber party with us were Yolanda Myers and Melanie Johnson, to name just a few of the other people here with me now. Yolanda and Melanie were two more of our mutual friends. But they were also girls with certain secrets that were yet-unknown to me and to many others, whether I knew those other people yet or not in my own life. It would be at least partly, if not entirely, because of them both and of Scarlett, at least, that my life as I then knew it would never be exactly the same again, in very short order.

The party soon started out with at least a few, if not a lot of board or card games between us all as the mood then struck each of us at it. But, eventually, as was inevitably going to be the case, most likely, given the usual nature of slumber parties at young girls' houses, the topics of discussion at it began to include things related to boys and men, for instance. Scarlett asked me, "What kind of man would you most like to have as your future boyfriend or husband, if at all possible, Faith?"

"I really don't know, Scarlett. I'm not really looking for anyone right now to potentially be either or both of those things for me anytime in the near future. Why do you ask, if I might ask you this here and now?"

"Because, Faith, you seem to be wishing for something or someone you can't actually have right now in your life. It seems that you rebel against authority, whenever possible, because you really want someone who actually will complement you well enough in your own life. You haven't evidently found the man yet in your life who might complete you sufficiently well in it."

"Maybe I'm not currently interested in having a boyfriend or husband anytime in the next five to ten years, Scarlett. Maybe there are no suitable enough young men out there for me right now, if there'll ever be."

"There's someone out there for you, Faith. There's always at least one someone out there for everyone, if I'm not too mistaken here in my own life. Even for people who may not necessarily be part of at least one, if not more than one, of the most popular groups of people in this world of ours. We are all what many people would perhaps call Misfits, for at least one reason, if not more than one, I think."

"What would you possibly know of being a Misfit, Scarlett?" I asked, even as Yolanda and Melanie handed me some cookies and some lemonade from a nearby platter on the floor of Scarlett's bedroom here.

"I know enough to know that many other people often think that my parents are rather weird because they are so into archeology that they don't do much else for a living, if anything else as well, in their lives. Also, I know enough to know that many people think that they don't really love us much because we're quite often left in the care of various others whenever they're actually on one of their archeological digs somewhere else in the world. But their assumptions about my parents are totally wrong. And they're often not willing to look beyond the surface of things in relation to my parents and the rest of my family's members. So I know at least something of what it is like to be a Misfit, Faith."

"I see, Scarlett. And what do you honestly think of quite often being left in the care of various others whenever your parents are away on their archeological digs elsewhere in the world, then, if I might ask?" I asked, between bites of my new cookies and sips of my lemonade here.

"I wish to see them happy, and if their archeological expeditions make them happy, then that pleases me quite considerably, Faith. And I can live with them being away often on them, I think, reasonably well. Sure, I may have missed certain important times with them in my life, of course. But so have many of my other close friends whose parents periodically work with them on their expeditions as well. Right, Yolanda?"

"Yes, Scarlett, that's true. Periodically, my parents do help yours on their various expeditions whenever the need arises. I sometimes wish that they'd be home more often in their lives. But people don't always get what they want in life, I think. For instance, I would really like to perhaps date Jonathan Brooks. But my parents say that I'm not yet old enough in my own life to do that in it. He is rather good-looking. And I get along quite well indeed with him in my karate classes at a martial arts center in Dreamrose not far from here, in fact." Yolanda's father was black, and her mother Asian. She looked a bit more like her mother than her father, for that matter.

Jonathan Brooks was now just about my age, more or less, with curly brownish-black hair just like his father had once had in his own youth. He was Caucasian, and had a rather weird sense of humor, from what little I'd heard about him so far in my own life. I had only occasionally seen him around Acadria High School's campus, but not very often at all did I see him around them, for our respective class schedules were generally quite different from each other as high school students there.

"You like him a lot, Yolanda?" asked Melanie, in a rather surprised manner. Melanie had a slightly lighter skin tone than did Yolanda. And that most likely was the case for Melanie here simply because her mother was Caucasian, not Asian, like Yolanda's was. One thing that they did actually have in common that I did know about, however, was that they each had fathers who were black. Another thing that they had in common was their mutual interest in perhaps eventually dating people of different ethnicities in their lives, and not just people of one particular skin color or ethnicity as many others in the world might often prefer to do in their own lives. They both saw nothing wrong at all with dating outside their own society-perceived race, in fact.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. I would gladly date him, if Mom and Dad would ever let me, by the way," said Yolanda, shortly after finishing the rest of her current glass of lemonade here.

"Maybe they don't want you to have to deal with certain people who might be opposed to the idea of you dating non-Asians or non-Blacks for at least a little while longer yet. There are still some people in this world who would prefer that we only date within our respective skin tone groups, in fact, Yolanda," said one of Scarlett's two younger twin sisters, a girl named Honey. Honey and her twin sister Cinnamon were each just about twelve years old, for that matter, with Honey being just about twenty or so minutes older than Cinnamon was. Cinnamon was just behind Honey, as Honey then played checkers with her near Scarlett's bed.

"Unfortunately, there still are such people around in this world, even in times when we have a black man named Alan Keyes as the President of the United States right now in it. Prejudice is always going to exist until the One who can destroy it once and for all in this Universe returns to Earth to set up His eternal Throne in Jerusalem someday yet in the future, I'm quite sure. You may be quite right, as well, in fact, Honey," said Yolanda, with both just a little bit of a frown and just a bit of nose-crinkling on her face as she did so here.

"Of course I am, Yolanda. As for myself, I wouldn't really mind someday eventually dating a non-Caucasian male, if the mood ever struck me to do that in my life. I might not ever do so, quite obviously enough. But I still really wouldn't mind it much, if that ever happened for me, in my life, I'm quite sure," said Honey, in very short order.

"Good for you, then, Honey. What about you, Faith? Would you date someone of a different race than you are, by any chance?"

"I really don't know, Yolanda. I might, if he were actually the kind of man I'd possibly be interested in dating long-term, if not permanently. I just don't know for sure just yet, though, if I ever will," answered I, as I also tried to get them to drop that topic of discussion around me for at least the time being. If not for the rest of the slumber party now in progress here at Scarlett Oliver's residence, in fact.

But the girls then with me at the slumber party here had all just found a mental thread of sorts that I hadn't actually been able to keep sufficiently hidden from them at it. And during the rest of the night, and even on into the rather wintery morning that eventually followed, they all periodically tugged on it, much to my own personal dismay at that particular time and place in my own life. All of them didn't really understand, just what they all had then awakened in me that long had remained quite dormant in my own life. Or at least not for some time, if ever, anyway.

Scarlett and all the other girls now with me here soon focused their gazes on me to at least some considerable degree. They did so for at least a little while here, before Cinnamon said aloud, all of a sudden, "There is a young man with partially-dyed hair who will quite possibly be in Faith's long-term future. He seems to be a real loner right now in his own life, and someone who is much in need of someone to love who can actually bring him out of his shell much more than he often prefers to be out of it. He knows very little, if anything, of true love at this particular time in his life. And what love he has ever had to date in it has often been rather painful indeed for him, as well. For he has known the pain of a broken heart at least once, if not twice, before in his own life. There was a certain girl he once encountered as a young boy several years ago not long after his moving here, at a dance for the general public in a city park around here. And he has been dreaming of her almost every single night since then, after they secretly shared their very first romantic kiss with each other behind a very tall rosebush in that park. He has spent many long years ever since trying to find that very same girl. But even after dating any number of other girls, sometimes against his will, he hasn't found her well enough just yet, it seems."

"How many times do I have to tell you girls I'm not looking for anyone to love right now?" questioned I, now somewhat flustered here, for the obvious reasons, of course. For I thought they were now talking about me as if I was that girl they'd just mentioned, of course.

Cinnamon continued, just as if I hadn't said anything, "This young girl is a rambunctious sort of girl, not easily tamed, and much is not as she would truly like it in her life. For many of the pieces of her life's quilt have not been found and restored to each other's presences. Her life's quilt is now missing many of its pieces, and until they're all found and all brought together as they all once were, all the pieces of her own soul will not be all together again as they all should be. She will search far and wide in her own mortal life, in order to find those still-missing pieces of her own personal soul, if needed. But no true peace will she actually find until they have all rejoined her life's quilt as they must do for her and their own goods in each other's lives."

Yolanda suddenly said, "Jitako Sashura Mibukotanu Kilastratum, Ujagarai Nolabukito Kalustorta Mujusa," which nobody here yet understood well enough in our respective lives. However, as I much later would come to know sufficiently well in my life, what she said then set certain things in motion almost immediately after she'd said those rather strange words in our presences here in Scarlett's bedroom. She'd just unintentionally set certain things in motion that many sentient beings in the Universe would actually come to be part of in due time, in fact. Whether or not they really wanted to be part of them in their respective existences, they'd all eventually be part of those things, just the same.

No more strange words or phrases were uttered by any of us, at least not knowingly, during the rest of the slumber party. But there was much more discussion of assorted topics, including boys and men, of course, between us all here in Scarlett's bedroom until we all began to eventually fall asleep in it while lying in assorted sleeping bags of ours in it. Or in Scarlett's bed, of course, as the need arose for each of us in it.

About 2:45 in the morning, though, and long before the other girls would probably begin to stir in either their bed or their sleeping bags, I suddenly felt the very strong urge to then go exploring in and/or around the Olivers' home for at least a little while, for some yet-unknown reason to me here. As quietly as a light breeze might often gently ruffle an average bird's feathers, I then slipped on my rather warm gold slippers currently sitting quite near my silver, black, copper, and gold sleeping bag. And then I rather carefully indeed picked my way over and around several sleeping girls as I made my way to the nearest door just as quietly, of course. Out that door I then went, eventually making my way to their attic, all while donning my coat on the way to it. I soon passed by the master bedroom and two other bedrooms after going up to the house's second floor on a spiral staircase. After rather silently moving past them all, I soon reached up and pulled on a certain strap hanging from a panel above my head. That strap came down, to reveal a set of ladder-like metal stairs. I then went up those same metal stairs and entered their home's attic in very short order. I soon moved to the nearest window in the attic, and suddenly saw, rather unexpectedly, two big black cat eyes brightly shining through the darkness outside it. They startled me at least a little, and I backed away from the window almost immediately after seeing them. I unexpectedly bumped into a nearby statue of what appeared to be a half-sized medieval female warrior of some sort, and which suddenly shifted without warning to one side to barely reveal a hidden trap door of some sort. As soon as I stepped on that hidden trap door, without knowing yet that I'd just done so, it then slid rather silently indeed to one side. And I soon found myself quite unexpectedly sliding down a sound-proofed multi-bend chute of some sort to an underground cavern still somewhat dimly-lit somewhere below the Olivers' residence, as I would later realize some length of time later.

I began to investigate the dimly-lit underground cavern, just as carefully as I then could, out of sheer and utter curiosity here. And I soon found myself in what appeared to be a secret nook that wasn't easily visible, if at all, from the specific chute that I'd entered the cavern through, for that cavern still remained relatively dimly-lit. At least at the current time, anyway. I had only barely brushed a few of my fingers unconsciously against one nearby stony wall of that cavern, and then found myself passing rather unexpectedly through the wall I'd just touched here briefly, once those very same fingers had encountered some rather strange markings on that wall of it. When I then tried to pass back through that very same wall just as I'd unexpectedly found myself in it, I quickly learned that I couldn't do that easily enough. At least not at the present time, anyway. So I somewhat reluctantly began exploring that nook, eventually coming to what then appeared to be a large and tall glass case with a base bearing the English words, "These items were all found on a previously-uncharted island near San Francisco, California, in August of AD 1991 during a routine pleasure cruise. Origin of items: Unknown. Age of items: Unknown." Several rather old-looking items of assorted sizes, shapes, and appearances were evidently in the case as I then read the plaque on its base, for that matter.

I studied the case and its surrounding area for at least a little while, hoping to find some way that I could actually get out of that nook well enough without much more delay, somehow. But nothing seemed to come to my mind at the present time that might possibly work well enough for me here and now. At least not yet, anyway. I eventually decided to try to make my way around the case I then saw in the rather dim light, in the hopes that perhaps I could find some other means of escape from the nook. As I tried to do that, I bumped my knees against the base of the case near the front left corner of it, and fell somewhat forward and to the right as I did so. My hands almost instantly flailed out in an instinctive attempt to hopefully break my fall well enough here. And they actually passed through the visible panes on the case's top, when I honestly thought they wouldn't, in much the same manner that I'd earlier passed through the wall into the secret nook I was now in. They almost immediately landed at an angle right on top of what appeared to be two earrings with three circles and two crescent moons on each of them, a jeweled pendant, an ancient-looking solid gold winged V-style tiara that looked much like the pendant, and a miniature sword with strangely familiar etched designs inside a similarly-decorated scabbard of some sort. My right hand had landed on the sword and the tiara, while my left had landed on the earrings and the pendant. When they did, a holographic setting of some sort suddenly flashed into view in front of me. It was a setting that included a still-young princess and an obvious suitor of hers on an alien world that seemed vaguely familiar to me for some yet-unknown reason. In her hands, she held a pendant much like the one that my left one had just landed on, and her forehead was bare as she sat on a bench near a fountain upon which her tiara currently rested. She was now looking at a seated orange-hooded figure who appeared to be just a bit taller and heavier than she was now in her life, although his face wasn't currently visible beneath his orange hood. She said, to him, in an almost-unhearable voice, "I will keep this locket for as long as I live, to the best of my ability, as a reminder of our true love and honest devotion for each other. At the moment, all I can give you is my quite-unworthy heart, even though you deserve much more than just that in your own glorious life right now. Someday in the future, my precious one, we both will be together for all eternity, Holy Ones willing, I'm quite sure. But, for now, at least, you must leave me again, because my skeptical guards would truly have you locked away from me, if they possibly could do just that here. Fly away, and fly free from here now, to your beautiful starry home until I call for you again, my dearest love!"

The young man immediately turned away from her, and ran into a nearby maze of sorts, so that he couldn't be caught by several young women who were then apparently about the same age as the Princess he'd just been talking to here. When he was sufficiently out of sight of all those young women, the Princess then secretly hid the locket he'd just given her somewhere on her person, even as she also put her tiara back on her forehead as needed. One of the other young women said, "You saw him again, I take it, Princess."

"Yes, I did, and there's nothing you can do to stop me from doing so again, Plerotaka."

"He isn't right for you, and you two will bring much destruction to this world and this system, without a doubt. Why can't you each just love people from your own home places, and not test the fates, so to speak, by dating people who aren't from them as well for either of you?"

"My heart says I must be free to love the person or persons who it is drawn to in my life, no matter who he or they might possibly ever be in it. And there is no other mortal sentient being in the whole known Universe that my own heart is so drawn to in my life besides him. My head may say my perhaps-eternal quest to love and to be loved by him is completely foolhardy, but my heart really just doesn't care. My heart is forever drawn to his own now, for that matter, Taka. Just as Ohejatan Bears are always quite inevitably drawn to Mokaboga berries just before their peak mating seasons begin every year here near this world's Equator, in fact."

The holographic figures now visible to me conversed for a little while longer, before the Princess's guards left her alone again where they now were, on her own orders to that effect. She remained near the fountain for a while longer, before eventually deciding to head to her chambers a significant distance away from it. Before she was out of range of whatever device had allowed her to be shown holographically later on then, she said, "Find me the Cosmic Trekker Crystal so that I can finally be free to marry you and so that I can finally best protect our system against those who would destroy it, whenever the need arises for me to do so in due time, my precious one. Only then will we be able to be together as we should be in our lives. And only then will I be able to sufficiently safeguard our solar system until the Holy Ones finally destroy the Wicked Ones' plans once and for all in this Universe of ours!" After she said those words inside the range of whatever device had been recording them somehow, she said no more, and was gone from it within another ten or so seconds, at most. Then the holographic images ceased to appear in front of me here and now, in fact.

After they did, I suddenly found myself lifting the items my hands had found themselves landing on rather unexpectedly some length of time before, so as to hopefully be able to examine them even closer than I'd yet done here. Starting with the earrings, by the way. The aforementioned earrings had three equally-sized circles and two crescent moons for each of them arranged as follows: One gold circle, which had a double stud-style back to it, one silver crystal moon with both its points facing up, one black circle, another silver crescent moon also with both its points facing up, and a copper-colored circle at the very bottom of each earring. All five elements for each earring were joined together on a small chain of sorts running from the gold circle's bottom half from just below where the double stud-style back was present on it to just above the center of the copper-colored circle's back, for that matter. Upon further inspection of the earrings, I eventually set them aside here again, before I picked up the jeweled pendant.

The jeweled pendant was a pendant which contained not only a certain precious stone bearing some rather unusual swirls of at least orange, black, silver, copper, and gold in it, but also what appeared to be a small copy of a painting of two people who were no more than just a few years older than the two sweethearts that I'd seen as holographic images minutes before. They both appeared to be very happy. At least for the most part, anyway. But both of their faces also showed at least some minor traces of real concern about certain things that weren't then at all obvious to me in any way, even as I looked at the painting of them in that pendant. I studied that pendant for a while, and soon noticed at least twenty or so now-unfilled recesses in it along its exterior sides and on its top. Why those were there, I didn't yet know, of course. I eventually set it aside, and picked up the tiara near it.

The solid gold winged V-style tiara was almost identical to the one that the Princess had actually worn in the particular holographic setting that I'd seen while she'd still been talking to her four then-present guards, in fact. The only real difference between both tiaras was the simple fact that the one that my right hand had just landed on moments earlier was now apparently missing four stones of some yet-unknown sorts on either side of a stone very much like the one inside the pendant at the very base of the tiara, for a current total of eight apparently-missing stones. The tiara's base would be directly above the nose of its wearer whenever she was wearing it, and often resting quite easily indeed on her forehead as might then be rather appropriate for her in her own mortal life. And its wings generally would flare up to her upper temples, if and whenever possible for her in it, as well. Of the nine places where stones could be present on the rather ancient-looking tiara that I now held, only one was then occupied apparently, as already stated. From that very same stone out, then, and moving somewhat gradually up the wings of the solid gold V-style tiara towards its ends, the eight apparently-empty recesses now showed hints of different colors as needed for them all here. From the central stone up, those eight recesses then showed somewhat faint hints of blue, red, green, and yellow, as was quite appropriate for each of them now. As each of the necessary stones was found that eventually would need to be found, those same stones would then be placed as appropriate in the tiara's other recesses. I soon set the tiara aside here, so that I could pick up the miniature sword and its scabbard for much closer examination here, of course.

The rather unusual sword was then about four or so inches long, at most, as I now held it very carefully indeed in both my hands, with the hilt taking up about a quarter or so, more or less, of its apparent length here. The scabbard that the sword was still then in here now seemed to be about half an inch or so, at most, longer than the blade that was currently inside it. But neither the sword nor the scabbard would actually stay at their current dimensions all the time, either, as I would later find out. Instead, they would both expand by a factor of six if and whenever necessary for me in the future, in fact. Designs I didn't yet recognize well enough here were now present on both the sword and scabbard, as I soon learned once I unsheathed that sword from its scabbard and looked at both of them even more closely at the current time here. I studied both of them quite closely indeed for at least five minutes apiece, if not even longer than that, before I returned them both to the places where they'd been when my hand had landed on them, and just as they'd each been resting there before, for that matter.

As soon as all the items inside the case had once again been restored to the exact same places in it they'd each been in when my hands had landed on them all, I brought my hands outside the case far enough to permit the case's apparent glass panes to reappear over and around them all. Once they were both far enough away from the case, the apparent glass panes then flashed back into visible sight here quite well indeed. And I soon backed away from the case enough to then suddenly read, in a still-strange language, just under the as-yet-unchanged English text, certain other text which I couldn't yet understand well enough. It would be invisible to most people's eyes, for they wouldn't generally know it was there, if they weren't familiar enough with it in their lives, for that matter. I rather quietly indeed read that normally-hidden text at a barely-audible vocal level for myself. And I soon found out that I could finally get out of the secret nook that I'd quite suddenly found myself then in after passing through the wall well enough some considerable length of time before.

After I passed back through the very same stone wall that I'd come through before, I then looked at that wall again, and saw, in the exact same language that I'd seen appear moments before under the English text that was still on the plaque for the display case I'd seen earlier, at least a few dozen new words, if not even more than that, here. For the strange markings had resolved themselves into much more recognizable letters to me, compared to how they'd still been before I'd passed unintentionally through the wall earlier. To most other people, however, they would still be quite untranslatable indeed. Unless, of course, they actually knew the language that those very same markings represented well enough in their respective lives. I didn't touch the wall again here, though, for I didn't know if I'd find myself back in the nook again as I'd earlier done rather unexpectedly indeed. But I did move away from it, and as I did, the cavern gradually began to brighten quite considerably. I looked around it and its immediate area, and soon saw other similar enough walls or chutes in it, but didn't pass through any other nearby stone walls when I then touched each of them here quite well enough for at least a few seconds. I didn't yet understand why, but would come to, in due time, if and whenever necessary. I eventually found myself going back to the same chute that I'd unintentionally found myself sliding into the cavern through, and I then climbed back into it, as the cavern's lighting gradually returned to the exact same level of brightness that it'd been at when I'd first come into it. I soon retraced the exact path that I'd taken quite unintentionally through it before, and rather quickly found myself in the very same room of the attic that the trap door was in. I soon passed through that door well enough, and the statute that I'd bumped up against some considerable length of time before returned quietly back to its normal position on top of that trap door.

I briefly went to the window through which I'd suddenly seen the big black cat eyes earlier, but they were no longer outside it. At least not as far as I then could tell here well enough, anyway. So I soon went back down the same metal stairs that I'd gained access to the attic through well enough, just before putting those stairs back up where I'd originally found them, just as I'd found them earlier. With that now done, I then very quietly indeed moved back past all three of the necessary bedrooms on the way to the required spiral staircase between the first and second floors of the Olivers' residence. I eventually made it back into my sleeping bag rather quietly indeed before anyone else besides me knew that I'd actually not remained in it all night long. It was actually 4:45 or so in the morning when I did so well enough, in fact. And I went right back to sleep, not waking again until after Mrs. Oliver had begun making breakfast for us all here, for that matter.

We all woke up at about 9:30 in the morning, after she did so, and we were all soon having breakfast with each other in the Olivers' dining room off a good-sized kitchen area with a central island present in it. The dining room's southern side faced a semi-adobe brick-walled patio looking out on a good-sized garden not far from the house that Dr. Oliver and Mrs. Oliver had originally started, but which Scarlett now often maintained with the help of her twin sisters Honey and Cinnamon, in fact.

While we were still eating, however, Dr. Oliver asked his wife, who was then finishing up the making of another stack of pancakes, "Did you, by any chance, go to the attic last night, Darling?"

"No, why?"

"Because as I was going there as I often do in the morning, I noticed that the strap for the stairs to them wasn't exactly as it normally is. I checked the strap, and it seemed fine enough, but I still went up to the attic. When I did, I soon noticed the almost-imperceptible hint of previous footsteps in the dust on the floor there. It seems someone made their own way to the attic as well, and did a little exploring there for at least a little while. I wonder who she was, for the footsteps seemed to be rather light as they made their ways through the attic. Even near one of the windows near it, in fact."

"Well, I was with you all night. Remember, Doctor?"

"True enough, my little sunflower. True enough."

Scarlett soon said, "Girls, Poppa and Momma must have had quite a bit much of the egg nog saved from Christmas last night. They're still acting rather mushy, as they're quite often wont to do in their lives, it seems to me here, in fact."

"So what if we did, Scarlett?" asked Mrs. Oliver. "We happen to really love the holiday season and just staying in our bedroom with each other, whenever possible, in fact. Someday, you might just feel the same way about a guy you might eventually marry, I think."

"I don't think I'm ever getting married, Momma. Sure, I might like boys and young men quite a bit, but I'm just not interested yet in ever getting married, if I ever will be. Why tie myself down too soon in life if I don't have to? I mean, you two didn't hit it right off with each other, did you? Or at least not at first, anyway?" asked Scarlett.

"No, I can't say that we did, once we were both found by someone who we later came to recognize as a truly caring and truly wise man in our lives. There were some rough spots between us both for quite some time before we eventually found ourselves pairing up and falling in love with each other, much to our and several other people's rather considerable surprise. We weren't the first couple on our team to pair up with someone not only as teammates, but as boyfriend and girlfriend, in fact. We were actually the fifth, if I remember things well enough here. And one of our teammates fell in mutual true love with someone who wasn't actually a member of our team, at least not at first. The first ones to pair up were Trini and Ethan, if I'm not too mistaken here."

"Really, Mom?" asked Honey.

"I believe so. Many people were quite surprised when they did so, and they were eventually followed by Cassie and Eric. Then after them, it was Alyssa and Damon. Then Waldo and his sweetheart Meagan, who was the one who wasn't actually part of our team that the man made us part of, did so as well. Followed eventually by both of us. And finally T..J. and Kelsey then got up enough nerve to fall in love with each other and get hitched, once your father and I really threw everyone for a major loop by falling for each other. Kelsey and T.J. figured that if we two were crazy enough to just get hitched to each other like we did, they might as well pair up with each other as well, and so they did it."

"That's not how Mom and Dad tell it around us, Mrs. Oliver," said Melanie.

"Oh, really? Care to enlighten us about how they tell it, then, Melanie?"

"Sure, Mrs. Oliver. They said that the four of you drew straws to see who the last two to get married from your team should be. And that you two somehow pulled a little switcheroo of the straws while their attentions were briefly drawn away by a little diversion you had Harmony cause for several of the moms from your group. That little switcheroo of yours then allowed you two to make it seem that my eventual parents were the most hesitant of all of you about pairing up with anyone, especially themselves, in their respective lives. But they actually weren't. And they were even already starting to secretly date each other when you two played your little switching of the straws trick against them then. True, they might not yet have been in real true love with each other just then. But they figured it'd not be too much longer in their lives if and when that ever happened well enough for them, in fact."

"Who else knew they were doing so, at that particular time, then, Melanie?" asked Scarlett.

"The Jameses, the Hendersons, and the Brookses, at least, if not anyone else as well from your parents' crowd of people, by the way." Melanie said, "My future parents weren't yet going steady, so to speak, with each other. But after your parents' trickery, they soon began doing so whenever they possibly could do just that in their own lives, Scarlett, in fact."

"And what do your parents think of our little switcheroo trick, then, Miss Johnson?" asked Dr. Oliver.

"Well, they weren't very happy then, for my future mother still had her eye secretly on you for a while. And my future father was still considering a few women as potential wives for himself in his own life. She doesn't really mind it at all if I might talk about it to anyone else from her favorite high school crowd of associates, by the way. Just as long as I don't do it too often, for your information, Dr. and Mrs. Oliver. You may not know this well enough here, Mrs. Oliver, but my future father was also considering you as his potential future wife when you and Dr. Oliver played your little switching straws trick with against them both then. However, things quite obviously didn't turn out to be that certain way, of course. And, because of that simple fact, I'm here now speaking to you, quite naturally enough."

"Have they forgiven us both, then, by any chance, Miss Johnson?" asked Dr. Oliver.

"Sure, but they still wish that you hadn't done what you did then, just the same, Dr. Oliver," answered Melanie, not too much later, in fact.

Eventually, we all finished our respective breakfasts in the Olivers' dining room, and soon we began collecting all our things from wherever they now were anywhere at all in the Olivers' home. That was so that we'd have them with ourselves as then needed once we each left for our respective residences anywhere else in the Acadria local area, wherever they might be in it, of course.

We began leaving the Olivers' residence at about 11:30 in the late morning, at the very earliest. And the last of us who'd gone there for the applicable slumber party were completely gone from there well enough by 2:30 pm, at the very latest, in any case at all. Even me. I was, in fact, the last of the Olivers' slumber party guests to leave their home after it ended. Little did I then know that I'd not actually make it back home again before I'd not only encounter, but also save, the cat that I'd seen earlier, for that matter.

Now back to the situation that the cat I'd rescued earlier from the tree that the dogs had trapped her in led me into here, if I may, people. As I said earlier, I wasn't actually looking for battle at all when she eventually led me on a wild-goose chase of sorts to somewhere else in the Acadria local area. But I eventually found it, just the same. I found myself in the middle of a battle once she led me to a place where some sort of rather strange being was attacking random people for some yet-unknown reason. This rather strange being appeared somewhat humanoid, but was soon confirmed to be sufficiently otherworldly or other-dimensioned due to the presence of several tentacles running from their sides to several other people near it at varying distances away near where a human being's arms would generally be on their body. These tentacles were currently pulsing in various colors, as if they were trying to squeeze the very life out of the people they were now holding with them somehow.

Near The Acadria Art Museum

Acadria, Minnesota, United States of America

January 1, 2008

The strange tentacled being was about 50 feet or so from the Acadria Art Museum as people were beginning to congregate near it for a special New Year's Day showing of certain new exhibits that had come into it the previous Friday, in fact. It was now perhaps about 5'8" and about 175 pounds of rather well-built alien being, with a humanoid face, octopus-like tentacles, and a roughly humanoid body, which was apparently female, as best as I then could possibly tell here well enough. Its face was rather mean-looking, and its skin tone was quite pale where visible, in many places. Its hair was rather snaky in its appearance, much like the Gorgons of ancient Greco-Roman mythology, but not quite there. It wasn't made up of actual snake forms here, mind you, but the locks of her hair still looked quite a bit like any snakes that I knew of well enough. Her attire was apparently quite Japanese in its general appearance, with a few hints of decoration in other places for it of cultures such as Roman-style sandals instead of Japanese-style house slippers, for instance.

When I saw the being well enough, I thought, "Oh, my, what an ugly thing! And I just hate her hair, the way it looks quite like snakes. I really hate snakes!" I soon said, "Hey, big ugly thing, why are you obviously attacking these people here, if I might ask?"

The alien being said, "Give me your energy, Human, for the good of the Negaverse and King Irbeyaru! We must avenge our losses of Queen Beryl and her Generals to humans! So give me your energy, and prepare to see your world destroyed or conquered!" She soon stretched out another tentacle that she had towards me, and I dodged it somewhat easily at the moment, for I was not too exhausted here yet.

She dropped a few of the people she'd just been draining, and the cat I spoke of earlier then hurried over to their sides, as if to check on them all. The cat said, all of a sudden, "Girl, these people must be defended, for if this alien and others who will eventually come to Earth aren't stopped, your whole world is in danger here!"

"And just how do you propose I do that, furball?" I asked, as I dodged several more tentacles sent my way, by rather unexpectedly leaping on top of a six-foot-high sculpture of some yet-unknown sort.

"Look into your heart, and the way to do that will come to you, Rebel!"

How did she know I was a rebel? For I hadn't told her that about myself in my life, for sure. I suddenly felt my eyes close rather unexpectedly as I dodged several more tentacle grabs by leaping to an even taller sculpture after the strange being came after me here, in fact. I continued to leap blindly from one sculpture to another, trusting my feet to land safely enough in whatever places I felt myself unconsciously leaping towards while my eyes were still closed here, for that matter. Twenty or so seconds after I felt my eyes close rather unexpectedly, the words "Kilakogo Lunar Power, Transform" came into my mind, and they reopened to find me rather suddenly shrouded in a pillar of silver, black, gold, and copper swirling light. This pillar of light around me somehow kept me both hidden from view and from being attacked temporarily by the alien who was well-focused on me at the moment, attention-wise.

I soon found myself in a fighting outfit very much indeed like that of a typical Japanese school girl that I'd often seen in any number of Japanese-themed manga, both online and in hard copy printed form, instead of the clothes that I'd still been wearing mere moments before around here. I had a solid gold tiara exactly like the one that I'd seen in the secret nook below the Olivers' residence now resting on my very own forehead with a similar stone to the one that had actually been in it then, along with a pair of copper and black puffed semi-translucent shoulder pads, a mostly silver choker, a silver leotard-like outfit with a narrow copper belt over a mostly gold miniskirt that had black, copper, and silver stripes and a black hem seam to it. Also I had a strangely familiar heart-shaped pendant, mostly copper front and back bows with silver, black, and gold trim which were each placed either under the pendant or in the small of my back, silver elbow-length gloves with three gold glove rings at their cuffs on my lower arms, and mostly silver ^-style knee-high boots each decorated with narrow black trim and copper crescent moons with points facing up just under the boots' black trim at their tops and copper soles to them both. Not to mention the fact that I was now wearing a mostly black bow generally trimmed in copper, silver, and gold positioned somewhat near my scalp on an otherwise unbound nearly waist-length ponytail that my blonde hair was currently in here, as well, for that matter. The uniform's skirt was perhaps about 20 inches long from my hips to its hem, and it was somewhat pleated, by the way. On my left hip, there was a long sword in a scabbard. A mostly silver and mostly metallic sash with three stripes of copper, black, and gold-colored trim from the outside in that now held any number of small projectiles of assorted kinds in various pockets behind it completed my new look as it then ran from my right shoulder to my left hip. Once I was completely transformed and evidently ready for battle, I then saw the pillar vanish almost instantly from around me as I found myself on top of a rather high statue near the closest part of the Museum's roof, in fact.

The alien had leapt to the statue nearest me, and as I introduced myself, they stopped to listen, for some strange reason, as if they wanted to get my name down and relay it to their superiors, if at all possible, by the way. I soon found myself saying, "I am Sailor Kilakogo, a major Misfit, and I'm here to stop you from draining these fine people this wintery day! They call me a Rebel, back where I come from, and on behalf of the Holy Ones' world of Kilakogo, I rebel against your Negaverse's evil plans to reconquer the Universe. Prepare to be Moonslashed to bits!"

"No such Sailor have I met! But you still look almost familiar to V'Bokayita, that you do! Prepare to serve the Negaverse, then, you will, if die you do not!"

"Never! Leave now, while you still can, or die trying to fight this Rebel Misfit!"

As if in answer to my challenge, she then charged me, and I found myself unexpectedly leaping to the ground below, after she suddenly released the three other people she still had wrapped up in her tentacles then. I had to do that, in hopes of keeping them all from being splatted on the nearby snow-covered pavement and ground near the Museum, of course. I reached with my left hand behind my sash and grabbed whatever projectiles I then could get my hand on fast enough, and I quickly tossed them out from behind it to the ground. Those projectiles managed to form a net between each other and the ground so as to catch the three people that V'Bokayita had just released, somehow, though I didn't yet know how. I landed near that net, and then instantly sprang back up in the air in hot pursuit of the alien, who had fled the immediate area of the Museum and begun heading east. I caught up to her about 2 miles later, about six miles directly north of where my family and I lived in the Acadria area of Minnesota. We were then still in the main area of Acadria's eastern half, municipally speaking, but not by much. The nearest building was the town's main newspaper headquarters, in a less-built-up area of town, and we were about 100 yards to the east of it in the middle of Main Street, by the way. She was waiting for me when I caught up to her, and when I was close enough for her to do so, she then picked up a few large rocks and hurled them in my direction, hoping to hit me with them well enough. I dodged most of them reasonably well, and cut others to much smaller sizes, but I still was at least grazed by some of them, for she sent quite a few of them at me before I could actually get at least close enough to her to counter-attack well enough here. I got within thirty yards of her position, and then I began sending various projectiles her way. Even as I also charged her current position with my brand-new sword still quite obviously unsheathed here.

Somehow, I actually managed to get within sufficient enough range of her to somehow slow, if not stop, her current rate of boulder-tossing at me. After that, it wasn't too much harder for me at all to finally get close enough to not only wound, but kill, her with my sword, by the way. Ten seconds, more or less, after I then killed her, her rather strange humanoid body completely turned into a pile of ashes. And it did so just before it rather suddenly disappeared sufficiently well from the specific place where she'd just fallen in a rather pitched battle against me here.

Moments later, after having looked at that place for a little while, I asked, "Why am I here, dressed in this quite ridiculous outfit, and what was that thing, and how are you even talking to me now, for that matter?"

"You are Sailor Kilakogo, that was an alien being from still another dimension of the Universe, and I am sentient enough to do that, for I come from somewhere cats often talked to each other and to various humanoid beings before, young Rebel," answered the cat, in very short order. To anyone else who might be seeing the cat and I here, it appeared that I was the only one talking in sufficiently recognizable speech now and that I was a little bit weird, at least, in her own life. But I didn't yet know that, and I wouldn't come to know it for at least a little while longer yet, in fact.

"I destroyed them. I've never destroyed a living human being before, as far as I know, in my life. What have I gotten myself into here, thanks to you?" I asked, realizing that I was now unquestionably a killer of some other sentient enough being from anywhere in the known Universe, and I always would be now.

"That was a not-entirely-human being, Sailor Kilakogo, as evidenced by the tentacles we both saw. There will be many more beings similar enough to that one who most likely will come to appear here on Earth to oppose you and others, at various intervals, it seems to me."

"Have you gotten me into a situation permanently now, most likely, furball?" I was not very happy at what I'd just done, of course.

"I suppose so, or at least until those who most likely would do what they possibly can to destroy your world or solar system, if not your Galaxy, are put out of business, so to speak, permanently, Sailor Kilakogo. In whatever ways they might then have at their respective disposals in their respective existences, anyway."

"I see. Now may I ask who you are, if you don't mind me asking here too much, then, furball?" I was getting more and more unhappy about what I'd just done, at the urging of this multi-colored feline who shouldn't realistically enough even be speaking to me in sufficiently recognizable human speech, for that matter.

"It's most certainly not furball, Sailor Kilakogo. And, before you ask, you certainly won't have to spend the rest of your life always in this state of being, in fact. My name I will reveal once you actually bring me to your family's residence, however, somewhere here in Acadria, Minnesota. And once I'm safely enough away from the eyes or ears of your parents or brother Lawrence, for that matter." She shot me a look of obvious annoyance with me calling her 'furball' for at least the third time since I saved her from the dogs like I did, by the way.

"How do you know about them?" I asked, quite surprised indeed here, of course, to hear that from her.

"Take me there, give me some cherry pie and some milk, and then I'll talk."

"And if I don't, then what?"

"You'll not find out who I am, Rebel, and how I know about you and your family, at least."

"You better not be trying to play tricks on me, cat. Or give me certain unnecessary orders like some cats I've often seen on some old anime show to certain other young characters they knew well enough in their lives, either, while you're at it." I then gave the cat as serious a glare as I could give it at the current time here well enough. But the cat didn't budge on her current position here. And she normally was just about as stubborn, more or less, about certain things as I quite often was about certain things in my own life. As I eventually would come to know quite well in the future, for that matter, and so would at least a few others. But I still didn't know that here well enough, of course.

"You want to know about me, and how I know about certain things. You know my conditions for talking about those things with you. If you want to know about them, then you have to do as I say, at least for now."

I eventually realized that I now had no choice but to do as the cat suggested. For an increasingly large crowd had somehow come increasingly close to the cat and I after the just-ended battle with me acting as if I didn't actually realize how foolish I might then be looking by talking to a cat where we both now were in the Acadria local area. So I quite hastily indeed grabbed her up in my arms and fled the scene here before they could get close enough somehow to snap our pictures quite well enough here. As I fled the scene with her in my arms, I soon stashed her inside of my coat, once she'd told me how to return well enough to my civilian state of being.

I didn't look behind me until we were at my family's residence. And she made absolutely no sounds of any kind at all needlessly here until we were quite securely indeed behind a locked bedroom door in it. And once I was quite sure my brother or my parents were quite certainly not going to hear or see or detect our conversation here in any possible enough way whatsoever, for that matter. I gave her a little bit of cherry pie on a small dish, a moderately-sized bowl of milk, and at least a little time to consume both before I then said, "You've had your requested items, cat. Now tell me here what you actually have to tell me, or those will be the last items you will get from me until you do."

"What do you want to know first?" she asked, once she'd cleaned the bowl and dish completely enough here and then hopped up onto my bed that now had three of the many quilts that I'd made before in my life on top of it. The uppermost one of the three quilts on my bed now was a quilt largely, though not entirely, featuring assorted national flags on it from all over Earth. Immediately below that one, there was a second quilt with certain patterns mainly, though not entirely, featuring assorted astronomical symbols on it. And the one immediately below that one generally featured sci-fi characters, books, TV shows, or movies, on it, wherever and whenever possible, closest to the silver, black, gold, and copper-colored sheets on my twin-size bed, for that matter. I didn't actually make the sheets now on my bed here, though, of course. Mother, in fact, had rather unexpectedly found them around my last birthday in a nearby arts and crafts store in Dreamrose. When she saw them, she just had to buy me several of them and other similar enough items to them for my birthday, as if she couldn't bring herself to let anyone else have a chance to get them before she did. She presented them to me on my last birthday, much to my surprise. I had often had them on my bed or elsewhere in my room ever since, by the way.

"First, what is your name, and I hope it's not something totally nutty, for that matter," I ordered.

"My name is Pakushai, and I've had that name all my life, as far as I know so far in it. My last owner, before she fell asleep and unintentionally left me to fend for myself, through no fault of her own, named me that. And I happen to really like my name. Don't ask me how she fell asleep, and how come she can no longer take care of me. For that is one thing I won't tell you here. At least not yet, if ever, Rebel."

"What kind of name is that?"

"I am not sure, come to think of it. But I like it, so I'm keeping it for the rest of my life, if I really have a choice in the matter here. What else do you want to know?"

"What is the Negaverse that alien spoke of, as far as you know?"

"According to others who've dealt with them in the past, it seems to be a part of the Universe where things are not exactly as they are normally in it. Think of it as an alternate dimension, if you will, where evil reigns whenever and wherever possible. Those several others quite often battled beings from there who sought to conquer or destroy Earth several years ago. That's if what they told me of it is accurate enough in the telling of its known characteristics and of the often-monstrous beings who came or come from there in the Universe, it seems to me. Several years ago, some Japanese schoolgirls, mainly, defeated beings from that Negaverse who sought to conquer or destroy Earth, as the case might be for each of them. The evil beings were led by two Queens, one above the other, and at least four Generals that I know of so far. One of the two Queens was Queen Metallia or Metaria, I believe, and the other was Queen Beryl, who was the Queen somewhere under Metallia or Metaria. Queen Beryl was the one who the Sailors and their allies knew better than the other one, and who they dealt with primarily, in terms of the Negaverse's two Queens, if not entirely. There were many monstrous beings that were quite similar to the one that you just fought a little while ago that the various Sailors and their allies periodically had to fight and defeat in battle, in order to save the Earth from being conquered and/or destroyed by the Negaverse."

"What's this have to do with me, then? Why are you here?"

"They now have found some way, evidently, to come back from wherever the Moon Princess Serena had banished them quite some time ago. And they now have begun to make plans to avenge the demise of Queen Beryl and certain others, from what I know of them so far from various other sources. There are also many other sentient beings who are out for revenge against several other people who also defended the Earth some time ago from various invasions of any and all kinds. Whether I'm familiar enough with them or not, it seems."

"Those facts don't answer my questions, cat."

"I was told by my last owner, before she fell asleep, that I eventually would have to help find and recruit a team of Sailors and Knights to combat the Negaverse and any number of other evil groups that may actually arise to try to conquer or destroy this world of Earth. You are one of the members of that team, it seems to me. Whether you want to be or not, you are. I was told to start my search by looking for a young woman matching your description, just before my last owner fell asleep as already stated. She'd been one to experience several visions, for instance. And, in at least one of them, if not more than one of them, that young woman was mentioned and seen in them."

"Who was she, then?"

"Someone who you most certainly indeed will hear much more of after you actually do find some more of your Sailor teammates, and once several of your Knights have appeared to fight alongside you all, for sure. Just not yet, for I'm prohibited from revealing her name at least until those things happen. I still will say here, however, that you and certain others who you eventually will encounter must both discover and protect the rightful heiress to the Kilakogon throne, whoever she might turn out to be, quite well enough. Even as you also search for the Enterprise Starmoon Crystal, among various other Crystals, which the Negaverse will also seek to gain sufficient enough control over, in their hopes to better further their plans of not only galactic conquest, but Universal conquest."

"And just how do you expect me to find these future Sailor and Knight teammates of mine? Or this Princess you just mentioned? Or the Crystals that you seem to think actually need finding as well, for that matter, furball?"

"If you're going to call me names, then I won't tell you. My name is Pakushai. Use it, or nothing you do can make me tell you what you might want to know here."

"Are you seriously giving me an order here?"

"No, just saying that if you're going to call me names, you shouldn't expect me to tell you what you want to know when you want to know it. I am a sentient being, much to your unexpected surprise here, without any doubt at all. And, as such, I feel that I deserve respect from certain other sentient enough beings in this Universe, whoever they might actually be, if and whenever possible, in fact."

"Please don't tell me you're going to be like many of the cats that I've seen on various related old Japanese anime shows, like Luna from _Sailor Moon_, for instance."

"I see. Well, believe it or not, she is a real cat, Rebel."

"Just how do you know I'm a rebel? And if you already know about Lawrence and my parents, do you also know my name?"

"Of course I know your name. It's Faith Kerpinsky. How else do you think I was able to find out about your brother and both of your parents? My last owner told me your name when she told me of at least one vision she'd had of a young woman matching your exact description, in fact. And she also told me that you were quite a rebel of a girl, for that matter. You won't remember her, for you haven't seen her for a very long time, it seems to me."

"How long ago, then, Pakushai?"

"Ten years ago, at the very latest, more or less. And it most certainly will take a major enough miracle of some sort to resurrect her from where she now rests, in any case, Faith. You once associated with her quite often, in fact. But she left where you were quite some time ago, and you haven't seen her since in your life."

"When and how can I find my future teammates, then?"

"Just continue to fight evil if and whenever it appears, no matter what kind of evil it is, and you'll eventually encounter them. I must let you know, though, before we go any further along with this new situation that we're both now in together, you'll not always find that they might get along quite well with you in your life, either as a civilian or as one of the members of your Sailor Team. However, your future boyfriend and/or husband will be helping you fight evil, if and whenever possible in the future, in due time, I'm quite sure."

"Not you too! I don't need a mere cat who shouldn't even be able to communicate with me well enough telling me that I need a young man, or any man, in my life to make me feel complete enough in it."

"You may not want one, at least right now in your life, but you're still going to both need and want one eventually, I'm quite sure. For, otherwise, you might just say goodbye to this world, if your new enemies have their ways well enough with and on it."

"I highly doubt that, Pakushai. And, by the way, just where were you planning to sleep tonight, if I might ask you this here?"

"Under your bed, where I know your mother secretly hid a cat bed, cat litter, and an appropriately-filled litter box about three weeks ago without your knowledge, somehow. Don't worry about my waste products, whatever they might be. For the litter box in question here is a rather special one that has certain secret features that not even she knows about just yet, Faith. If she ever will, of course."

"I see. And for food and water, at least, how do you expect to get those? I don't intend to be spending my allowance on you needlessly, mind you, if I don't have to."

"There already is a year's supply of perfectly safe cat food stored away in an often-hidden room of the attic here, Faith. As for water, or milk, I'll get them from Lawrence or any of the rest of you when needed. In fact, your mother thought a while back, around last Thanksgiving, that you needed a new animal in your life. At least one of them, anyway. So a pet store proprietor set her up with the cat litter, the cat bed, and all the necessary cat-related things at the same time that she last visited a pet store here, by the way. Your mother wasn't too hard to convince about the idea of your family having a cat, for instance, where you now live, just so you know this here well enough. The proprietor did a really good sales job on your mother, in convincing her that a cat was the best current animal to add to your family's home."

"And just how did he manage to do that here well enough?"

"I can't really say, but I do hear at least a few things from time to time around here. I can not only talk to certain humans, but also to assorted birds, dogs, snakes, horses, and fish. However, the dogs that treed me were sent by certain Negaverse spies scoping out the area around here for a new base of operations here on Earth. They'd actually seen the mark on my forehead, and recognized it as being from a certain place they were opposed to in this Universe, somehow. So they sent their dogs after me, so to speak, and treed me by the time that you saw me in the tree, of course."

We talked for a while longer, and got to know a little bit more about each other, as much as we were each able to do just that. Eventually, though, I decided to think about all the things that'd happened to me ever since around the time of the slumber party the previous day and night. And I told her to leave me alone, for I didn't want to talk anymore to her right now, and unlocked and opened my bedroom door here as needed. So she let me think about things in private, once she slipped out my bedroom door that I often would leave slightly ajar whenever I was in my room. Where she went in our house, I didn't know, and I didn't really care, for that matter, at the moment.

I sat on my bed cross-legged not long after she left, after having conversed with her for at least a good thirty minutes or so, if not even longer than that. My life had unquestionably changed permanently, thanks to that rather strange-looking alien that I'd fought earlier that day. I was not very happy that I had to fight and kill that alien, but I still had to do so, just the same. This kind of thing I hoped would not be quite common for me and others, but that sort of thing was not to be, as I and many others would quite often find out in our respective lives. For I didn't want to kill any sentient being of any kind if I ever really had a choice in the matter. However, Pakushai said, just before she left me alone to contemplate my obviously-changed circumstances, "You are going to have to kill other sentient beings, or they will kill you or any number of other such beings, I'm quite sure. Whether they're civilians or not, they unquestionably will, if they aren't stopped well enough from doing so here and now, whenever they might appear on Earth close enough to wherever you and others might be on it, in fact. Get used to it, Faith. You most certainly have now been drafted, whether you might possibly like it or not, to defend the Earth here and now. And certain others who also may not wish to be drafted for such a purpose will too, by the way, in their respective mortal lives."

I had often hunted and fished with various friends and relatives before in my life, but was not into it as much as several of them might be in it. Sure, I may have downed the occasional deer or duck or other forms of wild game, or caught any number of assorted fish, but I wasn't really into either hunting or fishing, in my life. Instead, I was more of a sort to do quilting or other things of a more creative nature. I had been known to paint occasionally in oils, and also to do some sculptures from time to time, in assorted media, ever since I was about ten years old or so in my life.

In fact, one of my most recent sets of sculptures carved in marble was at the Art Museum near where that alien had first engaged me in battle. That sculpture had been a major commissioned work of nearly two dozen figures in medieval warrior-style uniforms surrounding two moderately-sized cats, a Princess, and a Prince in a good-sized arc near a fountain in the middle of the Art Museum's ground floor. The figures weren't actually joined together around the aforementioned fountain here. But they were still made up of two dozen figures of assorted sizes and shapes, in any case at all. Twenty of the above-mentioned figures were part of that very same arc as various statues that looked almost life-like in their natures, as they were posed in various body configurations. The two cats each looked quite similar indeed to how Pakushai now looked in her life. And they were each flanking the Prince and Princess nearest the fountain on the Art Museum's ground floor. The one that looked most like Pakushai was next to the Princess. And the other cat was on the other side of the Prince from the Princess. The Prince was slightly behind and to the Princess's right here, with the Prince's hands on her mostly bare shoulders, and the Princess's hands rather gently covering his hands on them. Even as she now wore an off-the-shoulder sheath dress that appeared to be somehow made from rather expensive and rather luxurious silk with a multi-jeweled bodice and belt at her waist, and even though they were both entirely made here of marble. His head was positioned just over his hands as if he'd put it quite near the right side of her head at nearly the same height off the surrounding ground as hers was, by the way. This set of sculptures had been commissioned by the people at Acadria City Hall as part of one of their most recent city beautification efforts. At first, I hadn't wanted to do it, but when I needed money for other sculpture-type projects I'd agreed to eventually do for other people, I reluctantly took it on. It took me some time to find the proper materials for me to work with, but eventually I did so. I began work on those statues two or so years ago, after the end of the 2004-05 school year at Acadria High School, and it took me about six months to finish the last of the sculptures. Two weeks later, then, I delivered all those sculptures to the Art Museum's premises, and saw quite well to their eventual placement where the people at the Art Museum most wanted them to be in it. Once they were in place as needed and desired, I then signed over the whole set of sculptures over to the necessary people there, of course.

That was almost two years ago, as I now mention this to you here. The monetary amount they gave me for the commissioned sculptures was about $200,000 or so. But all but perhaps $6,000 of that was eaten up in the process of acquiring the necessary materials and other related expenses, and the tithe I always gave as needed to God, at the very least. Most of that money that I had remaining after the tithe and all other related expenses to the set of commissioned sculptures was then almost immediately plowed back into other work projects of mine, of whatever kind they might be. I was ultimately able to only retain about $2,000 of that money for my bank account at the Acadria Messenger Bank, in fact, people.

Little did I know yet that at least a few of the people that I had saved from the alien monster would become quite major parts of my life, in due time, whether I expected them to or not. Supposing, of course, that they weren't already that in it. I knew quite a few people in it, but not all of the people who'd eventually become part of my Sailor Team of fighters, just the same. And I didn't yet know which people I might now know or might later know in my life would become parts of my Sailor Team as well in the future, quite naturally enough.

I contemplated my life, both as it certainly had been before and as it was now certainly going to change for me, if it hadn't already, until just before my often-pesky brother Lawrence knocked on my door to let me know that supper was now ready for us all. He soon said, "Supper's ready, Big Sis. Come and get it before your cat does."

"What? I don't have a cat!"

"According to Mom and Pop, you do now. They were wondering when you'd find her, in fact. They even dreamed of her while you were at your slumber party last night, by the way."

"Get out of here! No way could they have done that, I'm quite sure."

"Well, according to them, they did so, when they told me about their dreams from last night while we were all having breakfast here this morning, Faith."

I soon chased him away from my room, and headed to our dining room, where I rather unexpectedly found Pakushai munching away on some sardines that my mother had put down in a bowl on the floor near the table. I soon asked, "Mother, why are you feeding that cat rather good sardines now?"

"Because she's now part of the family here, Faith. Why else would I be doing that? Granted, you may not have expected to have a cat now in your life. But she's just the right cat for you to have in order to better teach you how to be more responsible for you in it. At least that's what your father and I thought, once we saw her the first time a little while before supper here, anyway."

"But I AM quite responsible in my life, Mother. As evidenced by the fact that I help out around here and do a lot of work projects of various kinds, of course."

"Apparently not as responsible as we'd like you to be in it, if at all possible, Faith. So we're going to keep her, whether you like it or not. Get used to it. She's staying with us from now on, as long as she wants to, and we'll hear no obvious debate about it from you. And Lawrence, for that matter, is quite in support of the idea of you having a cat, for that matter. So the cat-related matter is closed, as far as we're all concerned here, whether you like it or not. The cat is yours, and you're going to be largely responsible for it, if and whenever possible," said Mother.

"Fine, but I don't really like it."

"Tough, Faith. Now what is the cat's name, if you care to enlighten us on it?" asked Father.

"Apparently it's Pakushai, for some strange reason."

"Then, Faith, Pakushai will be her name, at least while she's still living with us. All the needed supplies are in the attic, for that matter," said Father, as we all soon began to eat our suppers here with each other.

We had our suppers with each other for at least thirty minutes or so, with moderate enough amounts of conversation, whether necessary or desired. By 7:30 pm, then, we were all done with it, in terms of consuming it, at least. But not in the cleaning up after it, in any case at all. It took all of us about another fifteen minutes or so to clean up after supper as needed. After which, I was then allowed to return to my room if I really wished to here.

I wasted no time in doing so, once I was finally released by my parents from my just-ended supper-related cleanup duties. And Pakushai, the little furball, soon followed me into it, of course. As soon as we were again safely behind a completely locked and completely secured bedroom door, and once I was quite sure that no prying ears or eyes would try to spy on us here, I asked her, "What have you done with my parents? Why are they so determined that you have to stay with us now?"

"I did nothing to influence them into making it possible for me to stay here, Faith. They just saw me, and decided on the spot to do just that. I did nothing to them at all. I do not have the power to control their dreams or anyone else's, for that matter. Nor do I want it, if I ever could have it."

"You must have done something, Pakushai. Either you or your last owner or the people that Mom encountered that told her that it was a great idea that we should have a cat here in this house of ours. If not all of you, or anyone else in this world of ours, for that matter, I think." I lay down on my right side, and faced towards a movie poster from a still-recent inspirational-type movie put out by a Minnesota-based media conglomerate of moderate size.

"Nope, Faith. None of us did anything at all to somehow make those certain things actually happen here and now. And none of us will do anything, either, to cause the Negaverse to then send even more alien monsters to Earth to do what I told you they most likely will want to do, if we can possibly ever avoid it at all. They most certainly will come, no matter what we may or may not do, until they either conquer or destroy Earth, if at all possible. That is quite certain indeed, in fact." She leapt to a corner of my bed,

"I really don't like this at all, Pakushai. You barge quite suddenly indeed right into my life, when I'm not really much of a cat person, or much of an animal person, in it. And now it seems I'm stuck with you here for life, against my willing consent. Or at least until all these rather strange beings who you tell me will come are finally defeated as they might all need to be here. And you also told me that I'm going to have a future boyfriend and/or husband, when I'm not actually looking now for either or both of those things in the near future, at least."

"Well, I was drawn to you, and you to me. Why else would you have saved me from those dogs, if we weren't meant to be together, Faith?"

"Maybe I couldn't really stand to see any animal, no matter what kind of animal they might be, then somehow trapped by many more other animals anywhere when they didn't actually need to be, Pakushai. What would have most likely happened had I not come about just as I did earlier?"

"They might have eventually decided to form a pyramid of some sort, I think, until they were high enough in the tree to reach me quite well enough. If they then had somehow managed to actually get into the tree, and get high enough into it, I wouldn't likely have survived, based on a vision of a potential future that my last owner told me about before she fell asleep quite some time ago. They'd perhaps have torn me to shreds. In which case, that alien you defeated would have just continued to wreak havoc all around the area, at least, if not also anywhere else in Minnesota, until they were finally stopped from doing so well enough, somehow. For I wouldn't have been able to draft you into service as Sailor Kilakogo here to battle her, of course."

"I suppose not. Would they perhaps have done just that, for sure? Or are you just trying to scare me into believing you about the potential threats that this Negaverse may pose to Earth, at least, if not anywhere else in the Universe, Pakushai?"

"Yes, I'm quite certain indeed that they would've done just that, had the dogs you saved me from gotten me as I just described, Faith. There are perhaps countless other Sailors and Knights and other kinds of fighters from all over the Universe who fight evil, in fact. But they couldn't have actually abandoned their usual posts to come here to this particular area, normally, to fight evil here whenever it might then appear here. For they each do have their own respective areas of responsibility in their respective combat lives, not to mention each having civilian lives of their own, if and whenever they can possibly ever have them. They can't just drop everything else they might have in those various lives of theirs to come here and fight any and all evil beings or evil forces that might ever appear here, of course."

"What if they have common enemies? Do they team up with each other, then?"

"If and whenever necessary and possible, they often do. But not always, for various reasons, of course. It isn't very often where they actually are able to fight alongside each other in at least one major common battle, if not more than one. Or in at least one series of battles, if not more than one, in this Universe of ours. They can occasionally teleport from one place to another in their lives, but they normally would take other forms of transport in their lives, if and whenever possible, in fact, Faith."

"Isn't Tokyo one of the major places where they come from?"

"Yes, in at least one dimension of the Universe, it is. There are several Sailor Teams in assorted places and dimensions in this Universe, and more are being drafted as needed and possible, by the way. And, at least sometimes, it's often very hard for certain Sailor Teams to cross various dimensions to get to the Crystal Prime Dimension. That particular dimension in the Universe is the dimension that actually has Sailor Moon as the main leader of all the Sailors and Knights in at least the Tokyo area of Japan, if not anywhere else on the Earth from which they now come."

"Wouldn't she be in her thirties by now, perhaps?"

"Yes, but I don't actually happen to see you and others having to meet up with her while you're still battling the Negaverse monsters you're going to be facing quite often in due time. Or at least not for some time, if you eventually do have to, here in this dimension of yours. This dimension of yours is the Dreamrose Dimension of the Universe. In time, there are going to be two more Sailor Teams that'll be needed to defend any number of other solar systems in this dimension of ours in the Universe. However, in the Jerusalem Prime Dimension, there will be no Sailor Team, in actual reality. Or at least I don't think there actually will be, if there aren't already any Sailor Teams in active service or if there haven't ever been, in it. Each dimension of the Universe has its own specific characteristics, and an often-distinct signature of some sort, whether known or unknown. Some dimensions aren't very compatible, if at all, with each other, in the Universe. In which case, crossing between certain dimensions can often be quite dangerous, if not lethal, to anyone who tries to do that for a long enough time in their respective lives. That's unless they have been sufficiently acclimatized to it before they enter it, in fact. And if they were to eventually want or need to actually return to the most recent dimension they were in before their then-current one, they might also need to spend more time re-acclimatizing to that same dimension before returning to it, by the way."

"What's the Jerusalem Prime Dimension?"

"Apparently, that's a certain dimension of the Universe where the United States is, or will be, led by a person who quite possibly was, or will be, illegally elected somehow as U.S. President in a rather rigged and/or rather unfair election. Rigged by the majority of the Main Stream Media, in terms of unfair coverage of certain news events, among other things. Candidates from the Republican Party and other parties were not, or will not be, generally covered fairly and accurately enough. And there was, or there will be, evidently a real media witch-hunt of sorts against many people in the United States government of that time, at the very least. They were, or will be, quite against having the United States's military forces in Afghanistan or Iraq, after a major terrorist attack of only several years before in the United States. Among many other things, for that matter."

"I don't understand, Pakushai."

"In this particular dimension, a man who might possibly have been born in Kenya, not in the United States, will somehow come to power, if he hasn't already, as the supposed President of the United States. However, many people will call him certain other things, due to the circumstances directly pertaining to the related election cycle. Including such things as 'Dictator,' or 'Emperor,' for instance. He and his people will try, or have tried, to steal the election, and undoubtedly ruin the United States of that dimension."

"I see. And will others oppose them, if that's true?"

"They certainly will, if they haven't already. That dimension has seen much evil, and it will unquestionably see much more if those people are in power, it seems to me. For they're not necessarily people who are doing what they should be doing according to God's laws and commandments. For example, in the United States of that dimension, abortion is legal, and it has been since January 1973. Which has now most likely cost, or soon will have most likely cost, at least fifty million innocent babies their lives unnecessarily, under unwarranted circumstances."

"That's terrible!"

"And that's not the only bad thing that's often been happening in that dimension, of course."

"Really? Someone has to do something to stop the unneeded and unwarranted holocaust against innocent blood in that dimension. Can't anyone stop that sort of thing well enough, somehow, in a Godly enough manner?"

"Many people all over the Earth of that particular dimension have tried, but the holocaust still continues against the unborn and the newly-born for it. In fact, in some countries on that dimension's Earth, baby girls, whether born or unborn, are routinely killed for quite-unjustified reasons, whatever those quite-unjustified reasons might theoretically be, in quite-distinct favor of boys."

"What butchery! Girls are just as important as boys in this Universe, I think!"

"Many people seem to think that if they kill all the babies they can, they might be able to control the world's population easier, especially if they're girls, I think. Maybe so, but it's still not right, in God's eyes, at least, of course."

"You've got that right, for sure. Can't someone draft at least one Sailor Team or something to help combat against those who would butcher people quite needlessly and without just cause in that particular dimension?"

"Apparently not, for some yet-unknown reason, I think, Faith."

"Are the Negaverse beings we might face beings who might do such things, if at all possible, or not?"

"I really don't know for sure, Faith."

"If they are, then they most certainly will deserve to be punished for those sorts of things, if at all possible, and if warranted, as far as I'm concerned here."

"So are you fully on-board, then, with fighting the Negaverse, if and whenever they might ever send more of their monsters here to Earth, or not?"

"I'm not quite sure yet, to tell you the truth. Personally, you dragged me into this situation against my consent, and didn't give me a choice in the matter, really."

"True, I most likely didn't. But if someone didn't stop them, or at least try to stop them, somehow, then they'd most definitely have free rein to do whatever they might possibly wish to do to the Earth of this particular dimension, I'm quite sure, Faith. If you don't wish to see them do that at all, then you and others must do whatever you possibly can to defend Earth, or at least the part of it that you'd all be defending, of course."

"How soon can I expect some assistance in this situation, then?"

"I really don't know. It all depends on how soon you can find other members of your team and how soon they can join it, in order to fight against the Negaverse, I believe. Whether they're Sailors like you, Knights, or from some other group that would eventually become your allies, if I'm not too mistaken here, Faith."

We talked for quite some time longer before it was almost time for me to get to bed tonight. I would usually retire to my bed at night by 10:30 pm, and start getting ready for it around 9:45 pm or so, more or less. Eventually, Pakushai tired of conversing with me at the current time, so I let her out of my room again. And, besides, I had other things I wanted or needed to do anyway elsewhere in the house, whether they were bedtime-related or not. I soon opened my door, and she preceded me out of it by about two or so minutes, more or less. She went to the living room to curl up on a corner of our couch, and I went to the kitchen to fix myself a bedtime snack as I was often wont to do whenever I was at home on a typical night here in Acadria. Typical nights here in Acadria, however, would not always remain so peaceful much of the time. Although I didn't really know that yet, of course.

I returned to my room at about 10:15 pm, after that snack and a quick shower, and folded back the necessary quilts on my bed, just before picking up a science fiction novel set in Biblical times, with at least some, if not a considerable number of, fantasy-type elements present in it, on another Earth-like world. A fictional one, mind you, as far as I then knew, but still another Earth-like world, just the same.

I climbed into my bed not more than about another minute or two later, then, and began reading from where I'd last left off with reading it. I continued to read from it until about 11:30 pm, when I eventually began to feel my eyes get rather droopy indeed as I then read from that book. So I soon set the novel aside where I'd last laid it on a bedside cabinet, and turned out the light also on top of it. Five minutes, at most, later, I felt my eyes close and me falling into a state of slumber, as I lay on my back for a little while in my bed. My last sufficiently conscious thought before I was too far gone into a state of slumber here in my bed was, "I wish for true peace in this world and Universe of mine to prevail once and for all." But it wasn't actually going to happen for quite some time, if at all, as I would later come to learn here in my own mortal life, of course. I wouldn't arise again from my bed, then, until at least 6 in the morning, most likely, due to the simple fact that the following day wasn't actually going to be a school day for students in the Acadria School District of Minnesota.

Before I continue with my story here, everyone, I must say at least a few things, if not a good number of things, for this is where certain things start to get rather weird, and even more so for me, at least, than they'd already done for me ever since I'd first seen those big black cat eyes of Pakushai's. I didn't yet know it then. But my once and future boyfriend was among the people that I'd soon encounter, and even though I'd not actually recognize him as such for quite some time to come. Yes, I did say 'once and future boyfriend,' people. Looking back now, from at least a year or two later, I still don't understand fully how I didn't actually recognize him as such when I first encountered him in this particular time period. Both as a civilian and as a Knight on my Sailor Team that I was still working on forming, at Pakushai's rather persistent urging, as of that time and shortly thereafter.

This particular young man was a school year ahead of me at Acadria High School, about 5'8", and about 150 pounds, when I first encountered him rather unexpectedly only a few days, at the very most, after my very first battle against someone from the Negaverse. When I first encountered him rather unexpectedly, it was during my second battle against beings from the Negaverse. And he wasn't in a civilian form, either. He actually had, as I later found out, been somehow drawn to the location of that battle rather unconsciously. And he didn't yet know just how he'd changed from his civilian form to his combat form at all, when he found himself at it quite unexpectedly indeed. My most recent foe had sent some rather dangerous-looking things my way. And he'd appeared, all of a sudden, without either their prior knowledge or mine, before swooping down and snatching me up to a much higher place near where I then was in the middle of that rather heated battle, so that those things couldn't hit me at all somehow.

And not only had he showed up there, at that particular battle location, but so had four other young girls who I've since come to consider as real close friends of mine. Though they each weren't yet part of my eventual Sailor Team, for they hadn't yet been recognized as such well enough, they eventually would all become part of it as well, and also become real close friends of mine outside of Sailor Team-related matters, in due time. One of the four young girls was a Black girl, while the other three of them were all Caucasian girls.

Those other four young girls that I'm telling you all about now here were named, in their respective mortal lives, Melody Morgan-Wade, Colleen Warner, Thora Justice, and Abigail Breedlove. And each of them, future Sailors all, were generally considered social misfits for various reasons which I'll then share with you all as needed later, but which I didn't yet know of well enough at the time of my second battle against the Negaverse. As were each of their own respective Knights, as I'd learn in due time, for that matter, once I learned of them well enough as well.

When I found myself rather unexpectedly having to fight my second battle against various monster-type beings from the Negaverse, I'd just been at the town's main grocery store looking for some items on a grocery list that my mother had rather suddenly given me earlier that day at our home while I was still having my breakfast. Little, if at all, did I yet realize then, that not far from there, my next opponent would eventually appear and begin to try to wreak real havoc anywhere at all in Acadria. And do so to the best of her ability to then do so well enough, for that matter. She'd also be hunting for even more energy to give to her Negaverse superiors. But that was still quite unknown by me and many others from all over the Acadria local area until she'd finally decide to appear and show herself to actually be from the Negaverse, of course.

Now let's get back to the story, if we may, everyone. I'll now take you to the afternoon that found me fighting my second battle near _Acadria Foods_'s main building, and where I'd soon enough encounter not only that young man, but the four young girls that I just mentioned here to you all not too long ago, in fact, everyone.

Near _Acadria Foods_'s Main Building

Acadria, Minnesota, United States of America

January 4, 2008

I was loading our family's four-door Crown Victoria with several items I'd just purchased from the nearby grocery store, when some rather unexpected sounds of trouble then began to reach my ears from perhaps about 70 yards away, and from behind the store's main building. I was then in the parking lot for that grocery store, and putting several bags into the car's trunk and back seat areas as needed, in fact.

As soon as I heard those sounds well enough, I thought, "Oh, great! Next thing you know, Pakushai is bound to come try and find me here, if I know her well enough by now. I suppose that I'd better get to work before she gets here well enough, if at all possible, then." I quickly loaded the rest of the necessary things into the car's trunk and back seat as needed, and then locked the car quite securely indeed, of course. Once that was done, I immediately began to search for a safe enough place to transform into my Sailor Kilakogo state of being, for the obvious reasons.

I couldn't find it well enough, at least until I somehow saw out of the corner of my left eye a rather thick hedge, if I could call it that well enough here, of rather large and rather tall trees with a great deal of foliage to them all. I then quickly ducked behind them all, and powered up as needed here. Two minutes or so later, at most, then, I was then challenging the newest monster from the Negaverse, and asking her why she was causing trouble here for everyone else near the grocery store in question now.

She said, "Dinner! Come into my voracious stomach, you delectable Sailor! Come satisfy Makibyma with your luscious flesh and give me all your precious life energy so that I can give it all to the Negaverse!"

Just as I'd done with my only previous Negaverse opponent up to that particular time, I then said, "I am Sailor Kilakogo, a major Misfit, and I'm here to stop you from draining these fine people this wintery day! They call me a Rebel, back where I come from, and on behalf of the Holy Ones' world of Kilakogo, I rebel against your Negaverse's evil plans to reconquer the Universe. Prepare to be Moonslashed to bits!"

"You, a mere human, defeat Makibyma? You may have defeated V'Bokayita, but I will not be so easily defeated by you, for sure!" My new opponent looked like some sort of gigantic cross between a dragon and tiger, for the most part, with humanoid-like hands and feet, along with a humanoid-like face. Although she was much larger than the average humanoid being, due to her then being perhaps about thirteen or so feet high at her shoulder, with a roughly three-foot-long neck and a roughly 28-inch-high head from chin to crown. She also had perhaps thousands, if not millions, of scales of assorted sizes and shapes, and they were colored much like a Terran tiger's might be, for that matter. Most of both her arms and both her legs were covered by many of those assorted scales, as well. She was quite imposing in evident size and mass here, then, but perhaps she wouldn't be totally impossible for me to beat here, just the same. It might not be totally easy for me to beat her in battle. But perhaps I might find somehow to defeat her, even though I didn't yet know just how that might be achieved here well enough, for the obvious reasons.

We soon battled each other as best as we then could here, for at least a little while, before she started to chase after me here. Her gait was rather lumbering, but still rather fast, as I'd then set off into a rather brisk run away from the grocery store, trying to lure her away from it as best as I possibly could at the current time here. She soon took to flight, and swooped over me before I could get more than about a mile or so away from it, and blocked my attempts to draw her away from it any further. So I tried to think of another way to get the advantage over her here. It was just then she sent those rather dangerous-looking things my way in the battle as I was nearly pinned down by her near a semi-abandoned storage shed next to a mostly-empty lumber yard within a mile or so of the grocery store I'd just been at not long before. And it was just then when my first teammate swooped down and carried me up to a much higher place near where I now was, somehow, for that matter, blocking her further attempts at current pursuit of me by tossing some sort of grenade-like items between the two of us and her. Those grenade-like items exploded upon contact with the surrounding ground, blowing a whole lot of soil and other items into the air between her and us. Everything soon glowed with Sun-like brightness, in her face, and as it did, he and I both temporarily had our backs turned away and our ears covered with wrap-around combination light-dampening sunglasses and sound-dampening earphones at his sudden direction here.

We waited for about twenty or so seconds, until we heard a short series of low-volume bursts and saw a series of halos begin appearing just in front of where we were now looking near the lowest clouds in the skies above our heads here. When we saw the halos begin to appear, and heard the aforementioned booms, he suddenly said, "Finish them off before they regain their sight well enough to fight you here, Sailor Kilakogo. If you don't do so in the next five minutes or so, they'll most likely be able to regain it very soon afterward."

I immediately went to where they were now writhing on the ground in obvious pain from their burning eyes, and wasted no time in stabbing them in both eyes, both arms, both legs, and their chest wherever I had eventually located exposed portions of them well enough. Once I did so well enough, their scales began to shrink rather suddenly in size or disappear totally, and that allowed me to continue slashing at them and their body with my sword. Eventually, I found their hearts, lungs, and brains, and cut them to shreds, once I could get to them well enough with it. Five minutes after I'd leapt on top of them to start stabbing them in the eyes, at least, they then met their tragic end at my hands, of course. Tragic end, as far as they might be concerned, at least, for the obvious reasons here. After I did that well enough here, I then leapt right off of their body, even as it was beginning to vanish from sight here, and turn into mere ashes, just as V'Bokayita's body had earlier done before.

Once those ashes also vanished from sight as well, the yet-unidentified young man who'd unexpectedly swooped me out of the path of several rather dangerous-looking items said, "Well done, Sailor Kilakogo. I'll see you around, I'm quite sure, in the future." He was now wearing a mostly orange fighting outfit of some sort, or at least his current hood for it was mostly orange, if nothing else was as well, at least as far as I could then tell here well enough.

"Wait, please," I said, almost immediately, as he quite suddenly indeed turned to leave me alone here.

He paused for a minute, and turned his head, but just his head, back towards me here, asking, "Yes, Sailor Kilakogo? What do you want?"

"I want to thank you for saving me from those things, and I'd like to know who you are, if I may, please."

"You're welcome. As for who I am, I'm not quite sure at the moment. I don't even know why I am here, and where here is, for that matter, Sailor Kilakogo."

"Then might I see you again, by any chance, in the near future?"

"I really don't know. Perhaps, if our paths cross again, we might. I just don't know, though, Sailor Kilakogo. I look forward to our next potential encounter, if we'll eventually have one. For some strange reason here, I strongly suspect that we'll often see much of each other somehow in the future."

"Very well, then. I have no further questions for you at this time, it seems."

"Then I shall leave you to do whatever else you wish to do here right now."

"Fare thee well, brave young star-defender, then. I look forward as well to our next potential encounter, if and whenever it might then be."

Without another word or look, then, he left me alone again where we now were. I immediately hurried back as quickly as I could to the immediate area of the grocery store, powering down as I did so. I eventually arrived back there as several dozen people began to stir in and around the grocery store then in question. The very first people to stir there that I came upon well enough after returning to its premises sufficiently well were girls I'd quickly come to know as Melody, Colleen, Thora, and Abigail, in fact.

After I checked them all out as needed, I soon found four other young kids, who I first assumed to be Abigail's younger siblings, but who weren't actually her siblings in truth. I would later come to know the actual truth about them all eventually, but not for quite some time indeed. And only once Abigail and I, at least, had finally become close enough friends in her own mind for her to reveal the honest truth of their parentage to me and to certain other members of my Sailor Team, if and whenever possible and/or necessary, in fact.

The first of the girls that I checked out here quite well enough before some Acadria General Hospital-owned ambulances came to take care of the necessary people who weren't yet ambulatory enough here was Melody. Melody was then just about 5'7" and about 165 pounds, apparently, with light blue hair and green eyes. At the moment, she was wearing a medium blue mid-thigh-length winter coat over a mid-shin-length dress that was a few shades of blue darker than her coat and a pair of black snow boots. I would later learn that she was about nine months younger than I was, even as she now also wore a mostly royal blue stocking cap on her head here, in fact.

The second of the girls I then checked out here was a girl with bright red hair and medium brown eyes. She was Colleen Warner, and she now appeared to be about 5'5" and about 130 pounds, more or less. Colleen was due to turn 16 in about two months from the current date, more or less, though I didn't yet know that here, of course. And she was now wearing a full-length snowsuit that was mainly fire-engine red with a few stripes of several other colors where necessary and/or appropriate enough for her here. On her feet, she now wore a pair of boots that were colored almost as red as her hair now, for that matter. As well as a medium red stocking cap where needed, quite obviously enough, here

The third of the girls that I checked out here was Thora Justice. I thought that last name of hers was at least somewhat unusual, but I refrained from making any comments about it at this time, at least, if I wouldn't always do so in the future. Thora was about 6'5" and about 195 pounds, perhaps, with roughly shoulder-length brown hair currently drawn up into a bun inside her green hat and a pair of rather deep brown eyes. She and I would eventually become really close friends in our lives, and real close friends with several other people in our lives, but we still didn't know that here yet, either, for the obvious reasons here.

The fourth of the girls that I checked out here before the ambulances eventually came was Abigail Breedlove. As with Thora's last name, I thought that name seemed at least somewhat unusual, but I also didn't comment on it here and now, at least. Abigail Breedlove was now roughly about 5'10" and about 170 pounds, with naturally black hair that she'd mostly dyed blonde and a pair of chocolate brown eyes a few shades, perhaps, darker than either Colleen's eyes or Thora's eyes. She was rather dark-skinned, being a Black girl as she was here, quite obviously enough. Near her were four somewhat younger children, whose names I would all later learn, once I actually got to know her well enough in her life. She was lying on the ground near them all, having apparently tried to shield them from the Negaverse monster that I'd just killed when they'd first appeared near the grocery store in a small garden of sorts behind the grocery store's main building. Which, in fact, had been the case, though I didn't know that fact either at the time, of course. She appeared to be about 25 or so Terran years of age, but was actually much younger than that. And the four younger children then near her appeared to be anywhere from about 9 years old to about 15 years old, more or less, though they were each considerably younger than that, for reasons I would later come to know once I got to know Abigail well enough in her life, in fact. She was now wearing a mostly pink, red, and yellow full-length snowsuit.

Eventually, the ambulances came and took all the people that were sufficiently non-ambulatory away to the local hospital as needed here, of course. Before the four girls were put on stretchers and taken away in at least one or two of those ambulances, then, Melody suddenly said, "We'll see you again, Rebel, no doubt."

I was obviously quite surprised, and asked her, "How do you know I'm a Rebel, Melody?"

"The way that you just touched all of us with your hands here tells me that here well enough, young Faith Kerpinsky. You most certainly are a social misfit, and so are we all, it seems. It will all be as clear as the water on a still pond in summer, to you, just how I can now tell this about you, in due time. Colleen is a firebrand, Thora a fighter, Abigail a girl with a still-secret past, and I am a girl who is supposedly much too quiet in my own life whenever I should be otherwise, among many other things about any or all of us in our lives, in fact. And from the way that your hands just moved here while you checked us all out for any obvious injuries, it became quite evident indeed to me, at least, that you most certainly are now, and will most likely always be, a Rebel in your life."

She said no more to me here before she and everyone else was taken away from the grocery store that needed to be taken away from it here. I watched the ambulances pull away, and once they did, I suddenly heard a voice from somewhere near where I'd earlier transformed, "Good work, Faith. I'll see you back at the house as soon as possible, then, for a full battle report, if you don't mind too much."

"Later, Pakushai," I said, once I was sufficiently sure that nobody could hear me say that well enough here.

"Understood. But I want a full report, and nothing less than that, if at all possible, when we talk next to each other, Faith."

"You'll get what I feel you need to hear, at least, and other than that, you'll just have to hope for more than that, Pakushai."

"Don't hold out anything that might prove to be crucial information, if you can possibly avoid it, Faith."

"You'll get what you get, and that's all that you'll get, from me. Don't order me around, Pakushai."

Pakushai said no more to me at this time, at least, but I now knew that I'd better be more careful in the future with how I dealt with her, if at all possible. She then reluctantly left me to my own devices again here. But she still wasn't very happy with what I'd last said to her, as evidenced by the particular way she left me here just then, while also setting off to goodness-knows-where elsewhere in the Acadria local area. I returned to the Crown Victoria I'd parked in the grocery store's parking lot, and drove home soon afterward, after first stopping by the Acadria Public Library to return some items that my parents, my brother, and I had earlier checked out some length of time before, prior to the Christmas-related library closing. I dropped those things off as needed, and eventually returned home again by 4:45 pm. I spent at least a little time putting the groceries I'd just purchased for everyone in the necessary places all over our house, and then retreated to my room again, not long after doing so.

When I got there, Pakushai was sitting on my chair near my work desk, and apparently typing on my desktop computer that I normally would leave on all the time. As soon as I saw her doing so, I asked, "What do you think you're doing, Pakushai? Why are you near my computer now?"

She said, "Meow?" She said this here, because just at that instant, though I didn't yet know it, Lawrence and my parents were talking rather quietly to each other near my room about assorted things, and she didn't want them to know that she could actually talk in human speech here to certain people. That tipped me off, somehow, that others might then be nearing, or passing, my room, in fact. So I quickly secured my room as needed here from potential prying eyes, ears, and detection devices, of course.

"We're sufficiently clear for you to talk here, I think, now, Pakushai. Now explain what you're doing on my computer here, if you please."

"I'm looking up potential incidents of alien activity all over Earth from its history. Especially from the last fifteen to twenty years or so, in fact. I'm trying to find out if any of them might possibly be related in any way whatsoever to our new Negaverse enemies here, for that matter. No real success yet, it seems to me here, if I'll eventually have any about such things. There are numerous confirmed incidents of such activity, however, in multiple other dimensions of the Universe, according to several reports I've found on the Internet from any number of other people all over this world here, Faith."

"And what do those reports say?"

"Many of them seem to often mention the Negaverse and several, if not all, of the key members of it and/or its armed forces of some sort or sorts. Most of them that I've found so far, however, seem to mention various events in the Crystal Prime Dimension, if I can understand them well enough here, by the way."

"I see. And just how is such information possibly going to help us battle the Negaverse in this dimension, then, if I might ask you this, Pakushai?"

"It might help us to better oppose the Negaverse here in this one because we'd most likely be much more familiar with their most common battle techniques and philosophies, for instance, than if we didn't know these things about them at all, I think. Now I want to know all that you can currently tell me about the events of your most recent battle, and about the girls that you checked on earlier before the ambulances came and took them to the hospital here in Acadria, Faith."

Seeing no other choice, at least not at the current time, I then described the most recent battle's events as best as I could here to her, and told her about the people I'd encountered both at it and not long after it. As I did so, she noted those events into another computer file that she'd already started on my computer related to the Negaverse and its recent activity. Somehow, she'd managed to create a file that I hadn't actually seen before, and locked access to it so that I couldn't delete, modify, or access it without her prior consent. And not only that, but an entire folder of files that she'd just begun to create on my computer, since she'd barged into my life just a few days or so before like she'd just done.

"How do you know how to use a computer, Pakushai?"

"My last owner taught me how, Faith. I am quite well-versed in computer-related matters, in fact. And I'm going to log any and/or all Negaverse-related activities that I happen to learn of on your computer here, whether you like it or not. At least until we're able to sufficiently find a good place for our Sailor Team's headquarters here in the Acadria local area, if not even longer than that. Don't worry, you'll still have at least 500 Gigabytes of free hard drive space left on your desktop computer, by the time we get that headquarters for ourselves, if I'm not too mistaken here."

My desktop computer had total storage space of about 2.4 Terabytes on three hard drives. And the last time that I'd checked the free space from those drives a little while before, I still had about 1.3 Terabytes free space left overall on all three of them. I soon said, "You 're going to use about 800 Gigabytes on my three hard drives for such information, at most, if I get your drift here well enough. I think that you can't actually find that much information out about them well enough here, Pakushai."

"I can too, if I am able to access enough information about them related to any number of other dimensions anywhere at all in the Universe, I think, Faith. Once we get our future Sailor Team headquarters well enough in this area, we then will all have a main computer system there that'll be much more storage-capable than just your computer here. Every member of our Sailor Team will ultimately have a computer which will be linked to the main computer system at our Sailor Team's headquarters, for that matter. I have created at least one or two special folders on your computer that are, or will be, sufficiently related to the Negaverse or to still-potential future teammates of yours, with any number of other sub-folders and files as needed, already. You'll not be able to delete, modify, or access the contents of that particular folder or those particular folders without my prior consent, either." She soon closed the file that she'd just put the events related to my most recent battle in, and closed the related program as needed here. Then she searched for more information related to the topic that she'd been researching when I came into my room again some time before, for that matter. She browsed for at least a little while longer, accessing various sites of various kinds from all over the Internet, saving the gathered information or pictures as needed and/or desired, in various places on my computer's hard drives, before finally deciding that she'd done enough browsing on it for at least the time being here.

"You may now use your computer here again, if you'd like, Faith," she said, after finally securing the necessary data as she then saw fit to secure it here well enough to suit her quite sufficiently indeed. I wasn't happy with her, of course, for appropriating any space at all on my computer hard drives. But I couldn't stop her from doing so here, somehow. At least not yet, anyway, if I'd ever be able to in my life.

After she got done with doing whatever she wanted or needed to do at the current time on my computer, she then left the chair near my work desk and curled up on my bed a little while later. I then made quite sure that she'd not shed any of her fur either anywhere on or anywhere near my computer to the best of my ability here, and saw none of it anywhere on or near it. Which pleased me at least a little bit here, of course.

I then found certain other things to do on it for some good length of time, mostly games that I would often play on it, for that matter. I checked several places for personal e-mail for a while, before I did some searching of my own for sites related to other topics that often would interest me quite a bit in my own life here. I then did this until about 6:30 or so in the early evening, before I was eventually called to supper by my parents not long after that.

I didn't say much to Dad, Mom, and/or Lawrence at supper tonight. For I honestly didn't have much I either wanted or needed to talk about with them. At least not at the current time, anyway. I was released for the rest of the night at about 7:15 or so, more or less. After I was, I soon read from my Bible for at least an hour or so in my room.

Seeing as I would have no school the following day, then, I eventually decided to find some of my quilting supplies and work more on a quilt that I had recently started to work on, This quilt was perhaps about eight feet long, about six feet wide, and about three or four inches thick, in any case. I'd started it during the Thanksgiving break from school at Acadria High School, just as something to do, on a random whim, and had been working on it every so often ever since then.

I had mainly been working on the back and the interior of the quilt, ever since starting it, but I would soon spend more time with working on its front, which was basically undecorated at the current time. Places for future patches had already been marked out, but those future patches hadn't yet been placed on the quilt's front section as needed, for that matter. Little did I yet know that this particular quilt here would help to chronicle the growth of my Sailor Team, with the quilt's patches being added one patch at a time, normally.

I hadn't yet made the first of the patches for the front of the quilt, but I eventually would, just the same. I didn't know yet just how the quilt's patches would look for it once the quilt was done. But I still knew somehow that I would need to place a minimum of 22 patches of appropriate enough size on it, in any possible case at all, here.

I worked on the quilt's back and interior until they were done well enough to suit me here enough. That happened at about 10 or so at night. After which, I soon began to look through the various bits and pieces of assorted fabric that I then had on hand in my stockpiles of supplies, for I didn't feel tired enough to retire to my bed for the rest of the night, somehow. After then seeing that I didn't have very many, if any, of them available to me here at the current time, I soon began to think of how I could find or get more to use for my yet-undecorated quilt here, in very short order. I eventually remembered that I had some old clothes and assorted other items whose ultimate fates hadn't yet been sufficiently decided by me here. So I then looked for, and found, many of them, though not all of them, very soon after doing so. However, at least some of them were not sufficiently suitable for this quilt of mine, it seemed to be at that time. So I returned the old items that I then refused to use for the quilt here to wherever I'd just had them before here, no more than a few minutes or so later here. And then I quickly made a list of certain things to pick up the next time that I went to the place where I picked up a lot, if not all, of my various quilting-related supplies. The other items that I didn't reject, I put in another stack on top of my desk, near my computer. I pulled up a few programs that I often used while designing and making any number of quilts, and I then began to brainstorm ideas for at least one or two new patches for the quilt I'd just begun to work on again here, if not more than one or two for it.

It took me until perhaps midnight local time to do so well enough here. And I began to print out several designs that somehow actually crossed my mind at least well enough to then get to the design process on my computer here, not too much later, and most certainly by 12:45 in the morning of Saturday, January 5, 2008, in any case at all. I eventually put those designs in a new folder before filing them away in a file cabinet drawer where I normally kept all my quilt-related printed material, at the very least. I would take them out later, once I went to the necessary store either in Acadria or Dreamrose where I got most, if not all, of my various quilting-related supplies, at least, of course.

After I secured them in the necessary file cabinet drawer, I soon began to prepare for bed. Seeing as it was nearly 1 in the morning here, and seeing as I was now starting to feel tired enough to do so here, for all the obvious reasons. I was quite ready for bed here, and in my favorite silver, black, copper, and gold nightgown here, by 1:15 in the morning. But only after first having also gotten myself a bedtime snack of some chocolate milk and a little bit of German Chocolate cake that Mother had made not too long before the current time. I was in bed by 1:20, and my bedtime snack was completely consumed to the last grain and last drop no more than five minutes after that, for that matter. Pakushai wouldn't find anything she could poach off my plate and out of my glass while I was still quite soundly asleep, then. I soon stashed them in still another cabinet which she wouldn't be able to get into well enough here, for sure, and then returned one last time to my bed here. I climbed under my three rather warm quilts, and fell asleep by no later than 1:30 in the morning, in any case at all. And so I'd remain until at least 6, if not longer, supposing that I wasn't woken up again by anyone or anything at all by them, of course.


	3. Chapter Two: A Few More Misfits Join

Here's Chapter Two of _In God's Eyes, Even Misfits Are Precious!_, people. Hope you all enjoy it quite a bit here and now, of course. The next chapter for this story will be out as soon as I can figure out how I want it to go well enough, for sure. As for my other stories' next chapters, I will post them up as well, if and whenever possible. I am sort of stuck right now on certain things related to at least _The One You Miss Most_, by the way. But I still really hope to get sufficiently unstuck with at least one, if not more than one, of my current fan fiction-type stories on here someday very soon, if at all possible, for that matter. With no further ado, then, I will cut now to the story, with all the usual hopes, wishes, thoughts, and expectations here, if I may. This is The Universal Storyteller, therefore, signing off here and now, while also still gladly saying, "Happy reading, and God Bless! God willing, quite naturally enough!"

* * *

Chapter Two: A Few More Misfits Join The Team

* * *

My next occasion to meet up with at least one, if not more than one, of the future members of my Sailor Team came on Monday, January 7, 2008, when I, along with many others, went back to school after the Christmas break from it. I encountered the first of them that very morning, as I was heading to my locker, in the person of one Theo Norris. I didn't yet know him for sure in my life, but that would change rather suddenly indeed. I had at least some knowledge of him from other people, but as yet, we'd not had the chance to meet each other well enough for any reason whatsoever, in fact. From what little I knew of him to date, though, he had a reputation of being a loner, developed ever since 1999, when he and his parents moved to Acadria with each other. My family and I had only been in Acadria since 2003, so he had much stronger ties to Acadria than we did, it then seemed to me.

I also knew, from others, that he was an only child, though his parents had wanted more children besides him in their lives. God, however, had evidently not seen fit to bless them with other children, even though they were still trying to have at least one more natural child of their own. Theo also wanted another natural sibling as well in his life, but for some yet-unknown reason, he couldn't get one. As I would later find out from him, once I eventually knew him quite well enough, that fact helped contribute to the way he generally was in his life. They treated him as well as they possibly could, but they weren't quite as well-off as my family and I were. They lived in another part of the area that was less-developed than the part of it my family and I lived in. Most specifically, he and his parents lived more out in the country than did my family and I, and several of my future Sailor Team's members did the same.

Little did I yet know that once certain other people realized that we'd met each other well enough, they'd try to put us together whenever possible in our lives, in the hopes that I could somehow break him out of the rather thick shell of loneliness that pervaded his life at the current time. But that sort of thing was still somewhat in the future, much to our eventual surprise and various other feelings that we'd have, once we learned that well enough in our respective lives.

Now I shall take you here to the morning when we first encountered each other, not as Sailor and Knight, but as high school students at Acadria High School. We had already met each other before in this town, in fact. But we didn't yet realize it quite well enough. And we wouldn't actually realize it quite well enough for some time, perhaps. As I said, it was the morning of Monday, January 7, 2008, and we would begin to learn that the way things were actually for each of us in our lives wasn't necessarily just as our respective reputations in and around Acadria now seemed to say that they were in them. Our lives began to change for us both at about 8:10 in the morning, more or less, and two hearts began to intertwine with each other, though we'd not come to realize that yet for some time, for sure.

* * *

Near Our School Lockers

Acadria, Minnesota, United States of America

January 7, 2008

When we first encountered each other in a third-floor hallway of our school's main building, I was making my way towards my locker, and he towards his. Dozens of other students, both male and female, were in that hallway, while often doing and saying other things with each other in it, mostly as they got ready for the upcoming school day. My locker was on the other side of the aforementioned hallway from his, and not far from it across it. Several were congregated near Theo's locker, but none who would be part of our future Sailor Team, as I'd come to learn in due time, for that matter. They weren't congregated around him, but they were still congregated near him, around a few girls who were part of the 'popular' crowd at the school. People I didn't fit in well with, and who I'd never fit in well with, most likely, in my own life, by the way.

As we were making our ways to our respective lockers, Theo was reading a book about the Middle East that he'd recently checked out from a nearby public library. Most specifically one from the Dreamrose Public Library, as I'd later learn. Though I didn't yet know that here well enough. He wasn't really paying much attention to where he was going, and as a result, what happened mere moments later, wasn't all that surprising, perhaps. One or two of the people near the girls who were part of the 'popular' crowd eventually decided to try to have at least a little fun at his expense here. And once he was sufficiently near them both, and I was too, as I walked somewhat casually to my own locker in the applicable school hallway, they stuck out their hands and feet, and shoved and tripped him in the hallway here. He wasn't expecting that to happen here at all, seeing that his nose was still somewhat deeply stuck in the book that I mentioned, of course. And he fell almost instantly on top of me, or nearly so, sending us both to the floor here rather unexpectedly indeed, with our legs somewhat entangling with each other as we fell to the floor together.

At the moment, he was wearing a mostly orange outfit consisting of a hooded sweater and a pair of dyed or painted jeans, and a pair of light-sensing glasses over his light brown eyes. And I was wearing a mostly silver blouse over a pair of mostly copper and gold-colored slacks and a pair of black sneakers with silver trim where necessary. My ears were now bare, and nothing was around my neck at the current time, either. I had an analog watch that had the look, but not the price, of something a bit more expensive on my left wrist near a series of wildly-painted wooden bracelets that I'd made some length of time before in my life. And this watch of mine had been rather specially made for me years before not long after my family and I had moved to Dreamrose, as a rather unexpected birthday present from Dad. This watch had its numbers present in a somewhat jagged style, if and whenever possible, in fact, in hopes that it would reflect its owner's personality quite well in the future, for that matter. He, however, had none, and he normally wouldn't need one, for he was rather well-known for never, or almost never, being late for anything in his life, whenever he had to be somewhere at all in it.

I soon heard the snickers of several of the people in the hallway, and said, "Crusoe and Irving, you still have no real guts in your lives, it seems. Why must you pick on people like this boy here, when he didn't do anything to you to deserve such treatment?"

"We felt like it, Kerpinsky. What are you going to do about it?"

"Just you wait, you foolish Crusoe and Irving! I'll think of something. It may take time, but I'll still think of something. If I can't do anything about it, I'll find someone who can, in time, and then you'll be sorry!"

Another voice popped into things here, and said, "Oh, just lovely! The Loner with the Rebel, making woo with each other!" It was the voice of one of my chief annoyances, at least, in this entire school of mine. Most specifically, it was the voice of Martha Nash, a member of the 'popular' crowd in the school, with her supposed gorgeous looks and considerable familial wealth and connections. While, in truth, she wasn't all that gorgeous at all in her life, with her fake tan, her heavily-permed dirty-blonde hair and her unnatural body figure under big baggy sweaters and loose-flowing skirts often with assorted musical notes on them somewhere. She generally acted as if her family's wealth and societal connections were all that it really took to make someone beautiful and popular. And she'd been known to often date many boys from the more financially well-off parts of society all over the United States and/or the world, whether those boys were from Minnesota or from anywhere else in the world, for that matter. Even though I was a rebel, I was never the kind of girl to date a lot, and I never had been, at least to that point in my life. I knew from personal experience, in fact, that being a rebel shut me off from a lot of people that I might have otherwise enjoyed being with, either by my choice or theirs. But I could live with that knowledge, however unpleasant it might be for me at times. She hadn't yet come to the realization that dating a lot of people wasn't necessarily the best thing for her in her life, and I really didn't know if she ever would, though. We'd not often, if ever, seen eye-to-eye with each other on things in our lives, ever since my family and I had come to Acadria some time before. Our first meeting with each other wasn't very pleasant, and ever since, we had often been at each other's throats, so to speak, in at least one way, if not more than one. Little did I yet know, either then or now, that she would continue to often be a problem for me for some time in my life, even after certain other members of my future Sailor Team joined it. But none of those other members of my future Team would be among the next few members of it, in any case at all, here, just the same.

I looked at us both here a little bit, and caught a brief glance at her heavily-powdered and heavily-made-up face, as I did so. From all obvious appearances, it looked quite like he and I were kissing and embracing each other here. Although his lips were never closer than about two inches away from mine, and the rest of him above his knees wasn't generally less than that, in truth. "Oh, shut up, Nash! You don't know what you're talking about here!" I soon exclaimed. "You and your so-called 'popular' crowd wouldn't know about that sort of thing for sure, the way you often act around other people! You're just a bunch of phony fakers, at least for the most part, if not entirely!"

"Then why are you so close to him, Kerpinsky? Could it be that you're in love with him, with his wildly-dyed black, orange, and red hair?" asked another nearby girl. A girl named Julia Todd, in fact, who had clothes that looked like they came partly out of a shredder much of the time, wherever and whenever possible. Her clothes were even more ridiculous-looking than Nash's were, if that was even possible well enough here. She often tested the limits of what the school district and its personnel would allow their students to wear, for that matter. Julia had somewhat scraggly-looking dyed purple and green hair and rather disgusting-looking teeth. But she often ran around with a lot of the same people that Nash would, outside of school. And she had been really close friends with Nash for at least as long as I could remember well enough here ever since coming here with my family in 2003, if not even longer than that, which allowed her to be part of the 'popular' crowd at Acadria High School.

"I don't even know this guy here at all, so how can I possibly be in love with him, no matter what he might look like, Todd? Answer me that, if you possibly can well enough!"

"Well, for someone who you don't know at all, you sure seem to be rather close to him now, physically speaking, at least, Kerpinsky!"

"Oh, grow up and get a life, and learn how to take better care of yourself, for once! You look horrendous, to put it very mildly indeed here, Todd! You and all you 'popular' people are not necessarily quite as good-looking as you might actually seem to think. And one day, you're going to wish you hadn't messed with those of us you consider less-worthy of people's respect around here! You just wait and see, you foolish girl!" I somehow managed to get my legs untangled from his well enough as I was then saying that here, in fact. It was now just about 8:15 in the morning, about five minutes before we'd each need to be at our respective first classes of the day here, for that matter.

We parted from each other in very short order, and only barely, due to the rather unnecessary delay caused by Denzel Irving and Edward Crusoe, at least, managed to make it to our respective first classes of the school day in sufficient time as not to be late, or marked late, to class for us both here. It was just the start of another day as usual at Acadria High School for me. Which often meant that I'd butt heads, so to speak, with any number of teachers and/or other students whenever I thought they were being rather unfair to me or to those people who were sufficiently close to me at it. Today was no exception, as it had started off rather poorly indeed for me, due to the bullying of not only a young man who I'd come to know as Theo, but also of me, at least.

We encountered each other again on the way to lunch for students in grades 9 through 12 at Acadria High School, in fact. And when we did, I had a much better chance to get a look at him here, and he me, than we each had to look each other over at least a little bit that morning. His hood was now resting somewhat lightly on his shoulders, and his hair was now fully revealed to me as it hadn't been before now. It was mostly black, but there were several dyed orange and red streaks in it spaced somewhat randomly for him here, and it was in a moderately bushy style, but not too bushy, with perhaps a bit of a wave to it now. His mostly orange backpack was slung over his left shoulder, and a book about astronomy was now in his right hand, as he made his way to our school's main cafeteria area along with many other students.

Eventually, we ended up next to each other in the lunch lines, with him the person just ahead of me in ours. We studied each other momentarily as we waited for those ahead of us to decide what they wanted for lunch, and he eventually said, "So you're Faith Kerpinsky, the best quilter in the whole school, as far as I know to date. Or at least based on what I know of people's hobbies here well enough, anyway."

"Yes, I'm Faith Kerpinsky. And may I ask who you are?"

"I'm Theo Norris, a guy who often loves to read about a lot of things when I'm not otherwise occupied in my life, Miss Kerpinsky."

"So I've heard. Are you really into astronomy or into international geopolitics, perhaps, Mr. Norris?"

"Astronomy, yes. International geopolitics, not so much."

"I see. Do you have any other interests that I might perhaps be interested in, then?"

"Perhaps I do, but I'm not yet inclined to share them much, if at all, with you here."

We eventually received our respective lunches, and I suddenly had this urge to eat lunch with him at least once here. And not just days from now, but this particular day, for some yet-unknown reason. Normally, I would either eat lunch alone, or eat it with several of my then-close friends. But this was not to be a day when I did either, for my friends hadn't yet gotten their lunch items well enough, and if people didn't get to the main cafeteria soon enough for lunch when it was then time for them to have it, the available seating in it would be filled up rather quickly, more often than not. This would be a day when that happened here, so they'd have to find other places to sit in the main cafeteria other than where they and I would often eat lunch with each other. I soon found a table, and suddenly pulled him along with me after I found it. He asked me, quite surprised indeed, "What in the Galaxy do you think you're doing here and now, Miss Kerpinsky?"

"Finding us a table to have our lunches at before the good seats are all gone here, if at all possible, Mr. Norris," I soon said here. I quickly found us a table near a mural of a strangely familiar scene, though it was a scene that I couldn't remember ever seeing before here, for some yet-unknown reason.

This mural showed a somewhat pleasant and somewhat joyous scene on some faraway planet, apparently, with several humanoids and several animals near each other on what appeared to be a beach of some sort, during some sort of festival time. The humanoids there were modestly dressed, generally speaking, even as several of them were still wearing swimwear on that beach, either as they were about to swim in the nearby water or about to sunbathe on it. Two of them, quite strangely enough, strongly resembled both Theo and I, for some yet-unknown reason or reasons here. And he somehow realized that fact just before I did here, by the way.

He said, "Two of those people look quite a bit like either of us," once he had seen the mural well enough here at the current time. "I wonder why that is the case, and I wonder who did that mural when it was done here."

"A student from the class of 1983 did it, it seems to me," said Melody, rather unexpectedly and rather suddenly, as she then walked over to the mural in question here from somewhere behind us. "A girl by the name of Stephanie Marshall, if I'm not mistaken. In fact, there's even a girl who looks rather strangely like me for some yet-unknown reason present in it here."

"Do I know you, by any chance?" asked Theo of Melody.

"No, I don't believe you do. At least not yet, anyway," said Melody to Theo. "My name, by the way, is Melody Morgan-Wade. Yours is?"

"Theo Norris. So how do you know this young lady?" asked Theo, as he indicated me while I was picking up my fork so that I could begin having my lunch here well enough.

Melody said, "We met each other rather unexpectedly earlier, and have learned each other's names, at least, by now. We don't yet know each other fairly well in our respective lives, but for some yet-unknown reason, I think we just might do exactly that somehow, Mr. Norris."

I then asked, "Would you care to join us here, perhaps, Melody?"

"No, I don't think so. I have other plans, unfortunately. Perhaps some other time, I might just take you up on that offer, Faith. Okay?"

"Very well, Melody. Then I'll see you later, if that's all right with you."

"Sure, Faith. In the meantime, please enjoy your lunch together with him." Melody soon moved off to another table elsewhere in the main cafeteria, and we began having our lunch with each other here for a little while.

A little while later, Theo asked me, "What do you think of sports, by the way, Miss Kerpinsky?"

"Not really my thing, Mr. Norris. I'm more into quilting, painting, and sculpting than I am into sports-type things. Sure, sports are at least somewhat good and all, at least sometimes, but they're not one of my main interests, you see," I answered, between a sip of milk and a bit of meatloaf.

"I didn't know you were into painting and sculpture. Or at least not very well, if memory serves. Quilting, yes, but not the other things you just mentioned here, Miss Kerpinsky," said Theo, as he nibbled a bit on a piece of jellied toast now in his right hand.

"Well, I am. I have done several sculptures over at least the last year or so, and at least one of them is at the local art museum, if not more than one, in fact, Mr. Norris," I soon said.

He thought about that for a little while, as we continued having our lunches with each other, and eventually said, "I'll think about visiting the art museum, then, I suppose, to see what kind of work you might have on exhibit there here and now, sometime soon, if I can."

"I haven't exactly produced a lot of major works yet, but I think I might want to do various sculptures for a living once I get done with college well enough in my life, Mr. Norris. Ultimately, I may or may not become rather famous for my various projects of various kinds, but that's not essentially why I quilt, paint, or sculpt in my life if I don't absolutely have to. I do those things because I often enjoy doing them and producing the work that God inspires me to create and execute to the best of my abilities to do so in my life."

"I see. Well, good luck, or good fortune, with that, then, if at all possible, Miss Kerpinsky. I, however, am not so sure about just what I want to do with the rest of my life once I finally get out of school well enough in it."

"God willing, you eventually will find the certainty of purpose that you might yet be seeking in your life. At least, that's what I think here, anyway, Mr. Norris."

"Thank you for your kind words, Miss Kerpinsky. Now, if we may, let's try to finish our respective lunches just as quickly as we can, for our next class period is due to start in about ten minutes, if I'm not too mistaken here," said Theo, as he looked at a nearby wall clock.

So we did as he suggested here, and were done in sufficient time for us to get to our respective next classes at our school. We parted from each other near the main cafeteria, and then went to our respective next classes, of course, in very short order.

* * *

A few hours or so later, some length of time after school ended, I eventually went home again. On the way there, I encountered Pakushai again, as she was then patrolling in the local area. At the time I encountered her on the way home, she was patrolling the area, looking for potential allies of mine, as I found out from her sometime later. We had no idea just yet that Theo was one of them, or that he might be one of them, but we did know that I would still have to fight against the Negaverse again at least once more, if not even more than that.

I soon joined her on her patrol, once it was safe enough for me to go hide long enough to power up and become Sailor Kilakogo again here. We patrolled for a little while together, until the inevitable sounds of panic began to reach our ears from somewhere else in the local area. Together, we then hurried to where the sounds were coming from, and we both soon saw another Negaverse monster attempting to drain assorted people of their personal life energy somehow.

At the moment, several dozen people were trying to get away from that monster, but were currently unable to do so well enough, due to some sort of mostly-invisible barrier here, as I soon learned, after suddenly running into it rather unexpectedly indeed here. Among the people inside that barrier somewhere near Acadria General Hospital were people such as Jack and Tanya Landors, for example. I didn't know this at the time, but they also were associates from quite a while before of Dr. Oliver and his wife, to name just a few people here and now.

I soon began to try to get past that barrier, somehow, but was largely unable to pass through it until the young man who'd rescued me from harm in my second battle appeared and sent a few dozen things towards it. Specifically more of the things that he'd sent towards Makibyma to better protect me from her. Of course, we both protected our respective eyes and ears here sufficiently well just before they exploded well enough here, for the obvious reasons.

The exploding grenade-like items inflicted some, but not major, damage on the barrier. So he sent another salvo of them against that barrier, and then a third. It took four reasonably-sized salvos of such items to finally blow a big enough hole that wouldn't likely be able to be repaired fast enough in the aforementioned barrier. After which, we both entered through that hole, so as to directly battle the Negaverse monster now in question here.

The huge monster in question here looked like some sort of cross between a vulture, a human, a cheetah, and a fox, from what I could then gather about it here and now. They were roughly ten or so times the body size of a typical Terran bear of some sort, it seemed to me here and now. She, as I eventually learned, had a vulture-like forty-eyed head and eight sets of vulture-like rather large wings with mostly black feathers. Her name was Gatugha, and her eighty arms, eighty legs, and torso were rather human-like, except for mostly being covered by some cheetah-like fur instead of by some human-like skin. There were also eight fairly large purple and gray fox-like manipulatory tails present here, by the way. And in her human-like hands, she held a fairly good-sized turtle-like shield in one pair of them while also holding a six-foot-long multi-purpose multi-bladed weapon of some yet-unknown sort in a second, and any number of other people captive with any number of her other hands here. Her fighting outfit largely resembled a typical mythical dragon's scaly skin, but not entirely, in that there were several thousand small gaps in between the dragon-like scales that were rather unavoidably so for her, so as to better allow her potential mobility to some degree in any fight that she might find herself part of in her existence.

We carefully separated from each other rather quickly after passing through the breach in the barrier that my comrade-in-arms had just caused, of course, for the obvious reasons. While I moved to try to free others from the monster's current grasps here, he attempted to draw her attention away from me for at least a little while, quite naturally enough, with even more of his grenade-like items. I somehow managed to hit a few of the gaps between her scales with my sword and a number of other projectiles from behind my sash, and soon was rewarded by the removal of several of her arms and/or legs as she frantically tried to avoid my slashes and assorted projectiles, mainly through burning, disintegration, and/or vaporization. As we continued to battle, then, I was also somehow able to periodically evacuate a number of the people under the barrier out from under it. Eventually, the last of the captives was freed, just as my current comrade-in-arms was almost out of the grenade-like items he'd been sending off in the general direction of Gatugha during the current battle. And I soon sent him off to see to the captives' mutual welfare here as best as he could do just that here and now, seeing as he was beginning to tire somewhat quickly in the battle here, in fact.

With that done, that soon left me alone here with Gatugha, by which time, she was down to just four legs and four arms, no wings, and two tails. Between the two of us, we'd quite considerably weakened her, but she was still a potential threat, due to the simple fact that her weapon still had four sufficiently-usable blades to it here. I was also quite worn down, quite obviously enough, of course, but I could still fight, even after at least three or four hours of rather heated combat against her for the both of us.

She charged me periodically, and I dodged when I could, blocking when I couldn't, to the best of my current ability to do so. We battled on for at least another twenty minutes, if not even longer, with her mostly on the offensive, until things eventually started to turn my way in the still-ongoing battle here, due to the quickly-approaching nightfall here. As the battle continued, I seemed to periodically gain a good deal of strength and power from the rising moon in the skies above our heads, as if it was actually lending its light and power to me, somehow, though I didn't know or understand just yet how that might be the case for me, in fact.

When Gatugha realized this sufficiently well here, she then, at least, redoubled, if not at least quintupled, her especially frantic attempts to defeat me here, but was increasingly unsuccessful in doing so well enough. Instead, I soon flipped the battle's current script, so to speak, and quite rapidly turned the tide of battle, while quickly taking out all but two of her arms and legs apiece here. After her penultimate pairs of arms and legs disappeared, along with her last two tails, she seemed to swiftly shrink in size to much more human-like proportions, somehow. She then attempted to flee, in very short order, but I destroyed her turtle-like shield and her still-dangerous weapon almost immediately after she did that. That then completely vaporized what was still left of her barrier, and the energy-holding receptacle built into the shield I'd just destroyed here, for that matter. I cornered her near the entrance to the hospital's main parking lot, and she was unable to get away from me well enough here. I then charged her one last time, and when I was done dealing with her, her corpse soon hit the ground, just before turning into ashes that quickly blew away in the wind until they were just mere atoms, in essence.

Once all sufficiently-known and sufficiently-detectable traces of her presence were completely gone from here, I quickly vacated the area just as soon as I could do that well enough here. I soon found a secure enough place to power down, and then did so. Not too much later, then, I was back at home, about ten or so minutes before Pakushai was able to get to it, for I'd actually given her the slip somehow, while we were each heading away from the now-ended battle's location.

By the time that she entered my room again, then, it was just about 10:45 or so at night. I was working on some of my homework when she came in, while also wearing a mostly silver blouse and a pair of gold pajama bottoms, along with a pair of copper-colored slippers. Needless to say, she wasn't very happy with me for giving her the slip so soon after the battle. But I didn't really feel like talking much about the just-ended battle when I'd given her the slip earlier, and I still didn't, as she soon found out after entering my room here again, once it was safe enough for us to talk to each other in it.

Sure, she soon made me talk about it at least a little bit, but I didn't discuss the battle here and now with her as much as she then wanted me to. I didn't want her to know certain things that I gathered about our likely ally during the battle just yet, if it could be avoided at all somehow. I shared a little bit of information about him related to it, quite obviously enough, but not quite as much as she then wanted me to here, in fact.

Information such as the fact being that his eyes were orange, particularly of a shade often seen for most Terran oranges, if not all of them. At least when he was fighting like he'd been during the battle, anyway. Though I had somehow periodically caught what seemed to be flecks of light brown in them, particularly of the shade often seen for the plumage of a typical Terran House Wren, in fact.

Those flecks of light brown reminded me quite strangely enough of Theo Norris, for some yet-unknown reason to me. Though I didn't really understand just why then, I later would, quite some length of time later. Just not yet, for sure. Without Pakushai's actual knowledge here, I did personally resolve, however, to then do whatever I possibly could in order to safeguard his privacy, if and whenever possible, from sentient beings such as Pakushai, for just one good example here of such beings. But just how to do that well enough for at least a little while, if not permanently, I really wasn't quite sure of at the current time, at least.

Eventually, Pakushai tired of discussing various things with me, and went to sleep in her own bed not too long after that here, by the way. Once she was quite soundly asleep here, I then was fully able to get back to working on my homework, or doing whatever else I then needed or wanted to do here and now, of course. I soon got a midnight snack, at least, before bed, and retired to my own bed not too long after doing just that. I myself was quite soundly asleep in my own bed, for sure, by 12:30 in the morning of Tuesday, January 8, 2008, as I later found out from my mother, who'd just come back into our place from looking at the Moon and stars for at least a little while at about that time of night. Mother had this somewhat unusual habit of looking at the Moon and stars periodically around midnight, no matter what season it was wherever we might actually be in our respective lives. This night was one such night for her, even though the temperature outside still required her to wear somewhat warmer clothes here and now, for all the obvious reasons here and now. And so I slept, not likely to wake again until at least 6 in the morning, if not even later than that, quite naturally enough.

* * *

I didn't see much of Theo for the next few days, at least, but I did eventually find myself encountering several other people more and more often as the current school week still continued here. People like Melody, for example, who I eventually encountered just a few days, at most, after defeating Gatugha while I was on the way to the town library and while she was heading to a nearby Athletic Club to go swimming for at least a little while in one of its Olympic-sized swimming pools. The official name of that Athletic Club, however, was the Acadria Municipal Youth Activities Center, in fact.

I had been heading to the library fully intent on dropping off some books I'd recently finished reading when our paths crossed here. While she had just left the library after visiting it no more than five or so minutes before, as I later found out She then grabbed rather suddenly one of my hands, while saying, "Let's get back to the library and drop your things off there that need to be dropped off there, because I have to be at my training session very soon after now, in fact, Faith. My father will be at least a bit upset if I'm late for it, I think. You see, he's my main coach, and he wants me to train really hard indeed, in fact."

"What for?" I eventually managed to get out, as she essentially made me put the proverbial rubber to the sidewalks between where we'd encountered each other and the aforementioned library.

"He wants me to train really hard so that I might perhaps earn at least a few Olympic gold medals someday in swimming, Faith. But that's not really why I swim. I love swimming a lot, but still, he's perhaps pushing too hard here, just the same. I love him, of course, and don't want to upset him, but I don't really know how to tell him that just yet, unfortunately. He has to have everything be so perfect, and when it's not, he gets rather upset, you see."

As I dropped my books rather carefully indeed through the necessary return slot here and now, I soon asked her, "How so, Melody?"

"He gets even more determined to try to get his way, Faith. He comes on too strong, sometimes, with his demands, and I don't know how best to respond to them. I often get tongue-tied, and clam up under one of his periodic bouts of ranting and raving, you see. I don't know how to deal well with people like that, unfortunately."

"So why don't you just tell him you don't want to be pushed so hard with your training?"

Melody then said, "Because he's my coach, and he should be listened to, just because of that. Also, he's my father, which is another reason why I have to listen to him, and give him the respect he deserves, I think."

"Then how about I tell him to lay off you with your training sessions at least a little bit, Melody?"

"No, you can't do that. He doesn't like it when people he doesn't know tell him he's wrong, you see. And I don't know how he'd react just yet if you were to do that."

"Then he's just putting you at risk of serious injury here, I think, for his own selfish purposes, Melody."

"That may be so, but, still, he's my father, and I have to treat him with respect because of that."

"So you're just going to let him force you to do things that may not be right for you?"

"No, of course not."

"Sure seems like it to me," I said, as she continued on her way to the AMYAC.

"You don't know too much about me, at least not yet, Faith. So how do you know that he's not doing the right thing by me here?"

"From what little I know of you, especially since our meeting up with each other now, I suspect that I am right here to at least some degree. Fine, I will not press the potential issue or issues with him right now, at least. But I will not stand for potentially unfair treatment of you any more than I have to, and any longer than I have to. Go train now, if that is your wish, or don't. But please don't ever say to me that I didn't tell you that I thought he might be forcing you to do things that may not be right for you here and now, Melody."

"Understood, Faith. But is this how you talk with your own parents, then?"

"Not generally. But I do butt heads with them, so to speak, at least every so often, of course, Melody."

We eventually reached the AMYAC, and went inside. I followed her into one of the ladies' locker rooms, at her request, and soon found myself sitting on a wooden bench in them, as she began to change into a mostly blue and silver one-piece swimsuit for her training session. She soon had me remove my shoes and slip on some flip-flops, so that I'd be less likely to slip on wet tiling leading from the applicable ladies' locker room to the pool she'd then be swimming in here. After I did so, she soon stashed my shoes and several other things of mine in the same locker that she stashed her things in here, before leaving the locker room for the appropriate pool here.

We parted at the doorway nearest the pool to the locker room, and she soon entered the pool, while I moved to some nearby bleachers. Not long after doing that, I soon saw several other young girls and women enter the same pool as well, including, rather unexpectedly indeed, Martha Nash. I had no idea that Martha Nash was into swimming, or at least interested in being seen in a swimming pool, but that still didn't change my current impression of her very much, if at all. Or at least not right now, anyway, it didn't.

I watched Melody train for at least a little while with several others then in the pool with her. She did several laps in a medley fashion, at least at first, before her father eventually decided to have her work more on her backstroke here and now. I would perhaps have then left for the applicable ladies' locker room here after about thirty or so minutes of watching her train here and now. But that idea of mine soon totally vaporized itself permanently when I rather unexpectedly indeed then found myself, at least in terms of my eyes, if not in any number of other ways of any possible kind whatsoever, somehow inexorably drawn to a certain young man apparently taking a fairly good deal of notes where he then sat elsewhere in the bleachers. A certain young man who was now mainly in orange here, but with at least a little bit of black and red present as well, for that matter. I couldn't currently see his eyes at all here, due to the rather large hood over them at the present time, in fact. But I still somehow suspected that it was Theo then in those bleachers, just the same.

I mainly focused my present attention on Melody here and now, then, but still, at least periodically, glanced at the completely-hooded young man, whenever Melody was able to take a breather for at least a few brief moments here between her many laps well enough. Finally, when basically everyone in the pool left it behind well enough, the various spectators in the bleachers began to thin out at least a little bit, if not quite a lot here. Everyone except for Theo, and myself, anyway, at least.

I ultimately decided to stick around until Melody was finally able to leave the pool for the rest of the evening, and so therefore I did so. My parents probably wouldn't be very happy with me if I did so, for they generally preferred me to be back home in time for supper, if and whenever possible. But I still did so, just the same, here, for I wasn't yet sure if it would be best to leave her alone with her father/coach here, knowing what I now knew about things related to her swimming here, in fact.

Eventually, only Melody, her father, the hooded young man, and I were still around in the general area of the pool here. At least for a little while, anyway.

All of a sudden, the lights went completely out in the general area of the pool, and I began to get a very bad feeling here, for some yet-unknown reason. Seconds later, the lights over the bleachers the hooded young man and I were now in went completely out as well. I began to try to feel my way down the bleachers to the pool's main level, and suddenly a flash of orange swept me up and carried me into the nearest ladies' locker room, while the lights were all still out here. Once I was set down on the bench nearest Melody's locker, I heard someone say, "I don't know just who you are, but you seem to have at least one ability here that might make certain things right here well enough. Use it, and save your lady friend, as best as you can, as soon as you can, Quilting Maiden."

"Who are you, then?" I asked, through the darkness, hoping to get a vocalized response here, of course. But none was forthcoming, as a rather brief flash of orange soon appeared, before I was completely alone in the locker room again here.

I listened briefly for a few seconds, just to make absolutely sure of that fact, and then I very quietly said my transformation phrase here, for the obvious reasons here. No more than about twenty or so seconds later, I was again Sailor Kilakogo, and flashed out of the locker room back to the pool area just as quickly as I possibly could, under the cover of darkness. As I did so, I somehow saw a faint glow of light blue in the darkness, and it was starting to pulse quicker and quicker as even more time passed here. A magenta glow was trying to encircle it completely, but the light blue glow was fighting with it. All of a sudden, an orange glow of some sort moved to fight with the magenta glow alongside the light blue glow as well. The glows battled for a little while longer, as I began to glow a little bit with silver light starting to show just in front of me as I headed towards them all. I soon found myself leaping to a nearby diving board near them, and then I bounced off the board in such a manner that I headed directly towards the magenta glow now battling against the light blue and orange glows.

I felt my boots make contact with a stomach, which then forced the magenta glow back for at least a few seconds, if not even longer than that. Seconds later, I heard two splashes into the pool, one from the yet-unseen body of the magenta glow's possessor, and one from my hitting the water which they'd been hovering over mere moments before, as I later found out.

I somehow managed to land safely enough on the bottom of the pool without getting hurt while doing so, and the magenta glow's owner soon tried to head back towards the three of us now here just as quickly at it could. They charged while we were still unable to see them, and hit us a few times each, as they tried to get out of the water here quite well enough, for they really didn't take well to water here, evidently.

The magenta glow rose for a bit out of the water, but not too long after doing so, three different symbols flashed and began encircling it around here, much like they'd just tried to do with the light blue glow I was now seeing a little earlier around here. The symbols seemed strangely familiar for some reason, if I wasn't already well-acquainted with them here. And I soon began to feel a little bit more peace as their presences registered themselves well enough in my mind here and now.

One of them, of course, seemed somewhat more familiar to me than the others did, and that symbol was a crescent moon symbol of some sort mainly in silver, for all the obvious reasons here. The orange glow resolved itself into a mostly orange twelve-pointed star, with its points arranged much like the numbers on an analog clock might often be arranged. While the light blue glow soon formed a symbol in the approximate shape of a then-fin-standing dolphin actually wearing a four-quartered shield on its chest, more or less, it now seemed to me here.

The magenta glow began pulsing, as our three symbols got ever closer to it, and I soon saw a flash of orange blast from the rather sun-like symbol towards it. That almost instantly knocked the magenta glow a bit towards the light blue symbol, and the light blue symbol then struck out, and grabbed the nearest part of it in some sort of luminescent projection, somehow. My symbol, as I would later come to recognize it as such, then flashed, and shot several crescent moon-like bursts of silver light towards it.

The magenta glow then sent several bursts of magenta light towards me, in response, obviously enough. And I somehow dodged them no more than a few seconds later, as I then reached out from behind my sash to send a few projectiles of my own in their owner's current direction, springing up out of the pool as I did so. I was then rewarded by a lessening of the darkness around us to at least some degree here, right after my projectiles hit that magenta glow's owner here well enough.

The orange symbol's owner soon gathered me and the light blue glow's owner together here, slapping two pairs of protective sunglasses and earmuffs on our respective eyes and ears as needed here, and doing so rather quickly indeed, before quickly sending several orange flashes towards our common opponent. With me then knowing here that it was our mysterious ally doing so here, I immediately told the light blue symbol's possessor to not actually fight against him now when he placed the sunglasses and earmuffs on all our eyes and ears here. After which, I then heard a very quiet acceptance of that particular fact from that yet-unidentified person here, by the way, in fact.

A few seconds or so later, perhaps, there were at least a few small explosions here, and the monster's shroud of darkness soon disappeared completely from around us all here. When it did, we soon saw our opponent blown through a nearby window, and three of us standing in or near the pool, in full Sailor or Knight gear, as I'd later come to recognize them as such. An unconscious man was lying near one of the swimming platforms in the pool area, and of course, that man was Melody's father.

Also with me now here were Orange Hood and a young woman in a Sailor-style fighting uniform much like my own. She now wore a gold tiara moderately similar to my own, but not quite, with a green stone at its base. Her shoulder pads were of the exact same style as my own, but in light blue and dark blue, with the dark blue on them being in a corresponding location to the black for them on mine, and the light blue being congruent to the copper for me on mine. Also, her leotard-like outfit was light blue instead of silver like mine was, with an aqua belt instead of a copper one. Her uniform's miniskirt was dark blue, and bore three green stripes on it in roughly corresponding locations to the differently-colored ones on mine. She had mostly medium blue front and back bows, one under an aqua pendant and one in the small of her back, with green trim on them as well. Her elbow-length light blue gloves were cuffed with three dark blue glove rings, for that matter. As for the rest of her outfit, it consisted of light blue ankle boots with several shield-bearing dolphin symbols on either side of both boots and aqua boot soles, along with several utility pouches hanging from her belt, by the way. In her hands, she currently held nothing, but that wouldn't necessarily be the case too much longer, for her right hand was beginning to reach for something in one of those pouches.

As for Orange Hood, he was now getting out of the pool using one of the most common ways of getting out of it, in fact. He was quickly followed out of the pool by the yet-unidentified Sailor, who briefly checked on Melody's father here, before she ran after him as well, leaping through the window as needed here, quite naturally enough. I followed almost immediately after them, as quickly as I could, and snatched up at least a few projectiles I'd thrown earlier at our common opponent, for all the obvious reasons here, of course.

The magenta glow was soon pinned down in an alley not far from the AMYAC, and under considerable attack from Orange Hood and the other Sailor besides me who was now present around here. Eventually, the magenta glow could not avoid changing into a semi-humanoid appearance of some kind here. And they shape-shifted into a form that was primarily, if not entirely, some sort of humanoid-alligator fusion. At least it seemed that way to me at the time, if not permanently, anyway. Her skin was rather alligator-like, at least for the most part, and it was largely magenta-colored, though not entirely. The only parts of her that actually looked reasonably humanoid in their respective natures to me now were her roughly humanoid-sized chest, her two hands, her two eyes, and her two feet. Her alligator-like nose was roughly forty or so inches long with dozens of shark-like permanent teeth in her mouth, at least, as well. She now held two bladed weapons with jagged blades in front of her as she frantically tried to avoid being hit by several more of Orange Hood's grenade-like items and several icicle-like spikes that Sailor Cyanon, as I would later come to know the other Sailor as while we were periodically fighting together, was then sending her way.

I soon sent some regained and/or regenerated projectiles towards her, and she quickly found herself trapped by a good-sized number of spikes that Cyanon had proceeded to surround her with. In essence, she then was caged, so to speak, by those spikes from Cyanon here. We carefully approached that cage of sorts, for she was still at least somewhat dangerous here. She tried very hard to break out of that cage, but eventually, she realized that she was doomed, most likely, to be destroyed.

"Let me go, this servant of the Negaverse, this Jaiphra!"

"No, foolish Negaverse monster, we shall not let you go so that you can again terrorize anyone or anything else here somehow, at any possible time whatsoever," said Sailor Cyanon. "For trying to kill me, and/or my host, at least, if not anyone or anything else as well, you must die! But before you die, tell us who sent you!"

"This Jaiphra serves the one who ought to rule the Universe, along with his servants, in all times and places! I was sent by Queen Beryl, the now-revived Queen of the Shadow Realm, which you might recognize as the Negaverse, through her General Lord Jadeite the Flame Prince."

"I see. Well, then, we must see that your mission of service to the one who seeks destruction ends now. Any last words before Sailor Kilakogo destroys you, Jaiphra the fool?"

"You may kill this Jaiphra, but the Shadow Realm will prevail ultimately, by the will of Lord Lucifer!"

I then moved to somewhere near the cage of ice, and soon began stabbing Jaiphra several times, all while saying, "The overall leader of the Wicked Ones will never rule the Universe, by the Will of The Most High and True God of the Universe, Creator of all Holy Things and People in it! For your evil deeds, you shall pay, on behalf of the Holy Ones' world of Kilakogo! Prepare to be Moonslashed to bits, vile fool!"

No more than about two or so minutes later, at most, then, Jaiphra was completely ashes here. As her ashes soon began to turn to mere dust, then, Cyanon's ice spikes were rather quickly removed one or two at a time from the ground by her, and periodically de-materialized as needed, possible, and appropriate enough here. Once they were all no longer visible enough to any of us here, Orange Hood then moved in to recover several of the still-reasonably-intact grenade-like items he'd periodically sent towards Jaiphra during our chasing of her to where she'd fallen for his own reasons, in fact. I soon did the same for any number of the projectiles I'd sent towards her after leaping through the necessary window for the AMYAC, for all the obvious reasons here, of course.

"Thank you for your help in the battle here, Orange Hood," I said, not long after we each gathered up all possible evidence of the battle that we then could here.

Orange Hood said, "It is my job to help protect those who most likely will not be able to defend themselves, if and whenever possible, Sailor Kilakogo. A young girl was evidently in danger, and I moved to protect her as best as I could until she was able to better defend herself here. I shall see you again later, then, no doubt. Fare thee well, Jehovah willing, young Sailors!" Without another word, Orange Hood then walked off and quickly disappeared around a nearby corner.

After he left, Sailor Cyanon said, "So it looks like you have a male ally here. I wonder who he is in real life, then. Perhaps he's someone that we know already in person."

"I don't know about that, Miss Sailor Whoever-You-May-Be."

"If you must call me something, please call me Sailor Cyanon. In the meantime, I must leave, for I have some other things that I need to finish doing here, if I may. I will perhaps see you around again as well, Sailor Kilakogo."

Not long after that, Sailor Cyanon left me briefly alone in the place where we'd just destroyed Jaiphra here, and then I headed back to the AMYAC, for all the obvious reasons here, as well. By the time that I returned to the pool area, then, Melody was already in the ladies' locker room, as I later learned from her. And her father was waiting for her outside them in the nearest hallway to it, having fully regained consciousness somehow not very long after Orange Hood, Sailor Cyanon and I had permanently defeated Jaiphra as we had just done.

I soon joined her there, and then we eventually left the ladies' locker room as needed with each other. When her father saw me, he then said to Melody, "Who is this young girl, if I might ask, Melody?"

"She's a girl from my school, in the grade above me, if I'm not too mistaken here, Father. We met on my way here, in fact. And we came here together, as well. She watched at least some of my training session here, for that matter. Her name is Faith Kerpinsky, by the way."

"I see. And what do you think of my daughter, then, Miss Kerpinsky?"

"She is a really good swimmer, Mr. Morgan-Wade. I don't know much about her just yet, but I think she might just do at least reasonably well in whatever she sets her mind to do in her life, if given enough of a fair chance to do so in it."

"Reasonably well at something does not cut it with me, generally. She must do the best that she possibly can at anything she does, if and whenever she possibly can do just that, Miss Kerpinsky. The world is a dog-eat-dog world, more often than not, and only the strongest survive, generally, if I'm not mistaken too much here."

"I think not, Mr. Morgan-Wade. But, seriously, I really don't have time to debate the issue with you. At least not right now, it seems to me. I really have to get home myself now, anyway. I'm probably already at least a little late for my family's supper now, for that matter. With that, then, I shall bid you both good night."

Not too much later, then, I was back home, and it was somewhat near 7:30 in the evening of Thursday, January 10, 2008. I quickly dropped my things off in my room, and was eating supper with the rest of my family by no later than 7:45 pm, in any case at all. Supper on the current evening was a somewhat quiet affair, and none of us really said much of anything at all to each other if we didn't really have to here and now.

I was back in my room likely for the rest of the night by no later than 8:30, and working on at least some, if not all, of my current homework by no later than 8:45. I worked on it for at least an hour or two before setting my books aside as needed and/or desired here. After which, I soon picked up a few quilting-related supplies and worked on the quilt that would most likely chronicle the growth of my Sailor Team, in fact.

I soon had made a patch that bore a design that I would eventually come to recognize as being sufficiently Kilakogo-related someday yet in the future, but which I didn't yet recognize as such. This design mainly featured circles and crescent moons for it, but not entirely, in fact. And that design was centered as needed on the patch in question here, quite naturally enough, of course, before I applied that patch where it then needed to be on the quilt's front in the upper left corner as one might perhaps see it well enough if it was ever hung on a wall, for instance, in front of them for whatever reason or reasons.

A second patch mainly featuring at least one stylized sun of some sort soon joined the first patch on the quilt next to it, to the right of it as it might appear to anyone looking at it if and whenever it was hanging on a wall or from a ceiling well enough, by the way. Of course, the stylized sun or suns then on that patch then had twelve points to them here, for all the obvious reasons here, for that matter. After finishing the application of that patch to the front of the quilt now in question here, I then began preparing a third patch for the same thing here, in like manner.

The third patch soon bore a design quite like the one that I'd seen earlier mainly in light blue during the battle with Jaiphra while we were still fighting her in the dark at the AMYAC quite some time before here. Once that third patch was made at least well enough to suit me sufficiently well here, I very quickly indeed sewed it right to the front of the quilt, as well, wherever it was then necessary for me to do just that. Just as I'd done with the two patches I'd placed on it not long before, of course. It really didn't take me too long at all to do just that, and then I quickly began stowing away my currently-present quilting supplies and the quilt as needed here, quite naturally enough. With that then done, I soon began to get ready for bed, and was just about ready to climb into bed when my cat decided to show up in my room again here and now.

She soon made me talk, somehow, about the just-fought battle against Jaiphra. And I then did so, once it was sufficiently safe for me to do just that, for at least a little while, even though I really wanted to get to sleep again here, seeing as it was now rapidly approaching local midnight here. Eventually, though, she let me be, and we both fell asleep in my bed not too long after she did that here, by the way. And so we both slept somewhat soundly indeed in it, quite naturally enough, for that matter.

* * *

Just about a week or so later, more or less, while I was then out with Melody on an after-school shopping excursion to various places, including to a certain music-oriented three-story store/residence near the middle of town, we both encountered Colleen rather unexpectedly indeed. We encountered her as she was then running the main cash register there at least temporarily for her parents, and most specifically her father Rufus, who often moonlighted as a core member of a semi-famous local country musical group called "Flaming Charioteers," in fact. We were both looking for some music that we might each enjoy when we then encountered her in a store that was actually called "Notes Afire," for that matter. The music store part of the building here then took up much of the two lowest floors of the building, while the Warner family mainly resided in the remainder of the good-sized building that housed their music store and residence, by the way.

We soon paid her for our desired purposes, and decided to sit down at a table near a window in the store for a few moments, at least, for our feet were starting to feel a little heavy from a good deal of walking around during our current shopping expedition here. Not long after that, Colleen's mother relieved her at the register, and Colleen came over to us here for at least a little bit, if not a lot. We got to talking, and were still talking when we were suddenly interrupted by a series of inevitable screams. I really wasn't surprised, of course, for the obvious reasons. I suddenly set down the things that were now in my hands, whatever they were, and then hurried out of the store, without a single word to anyone. Melody soon followed me out of it, in like manner, and we both soon found a place to power up safely enough. Or at least we thought we had, before eventually realizing that Colleen had unexpectedly followed us out of the store and almost immediately afterward had gotten herself snatched up by our next opponent from the Negaverse. Yes, Melody and I had learned each other's secret identities since the battle with Jaiphra, due to her encountering Pakushai near me in both my combat and civilian states. From there, she put the pieces together relatively well and relatively fast, and so we decided to confirm our respective suspicions about each other and our own double identities. We still didn't know just who Orange Hood was in his civilian state, and vice versa, for we'd not really seen much, if anything, of him since the battle with Jaiphra was successfully ended here.

By the time we both realized quite well enough here that Colleen had just been snared by our next opponent along with at least several others, a few minutes had already passed for us both after we'd run out of the music store as we just had not too long before. But we both soon realized just what was going on, quite well enough, and went right to work on our next Negaverse-affiliated opponent here, as best and as quickly as we then could here, of course.

The monster, who appeared to be some sort of female being, soon introduced themselves as Horiarn, and they looked like an especially bizarre fusion of some sort between a goat, a spider, a python, a chimpanzee, a vulture, and a coyote, even as they were now attempting to drain several people of their energy here and now. It was absolutely ludicrous-looking, to be totally honest here and now. The monster actually had two goat-like horns, eight spider-like legs, eight python-like tails, two chimpanzee-like arms, a vulture-like torso that included two vulture-like wings, and a coyote-like head, for that matter.

The first one of us to engage Horiarn here was Cyanon, and she tried attacking it with several good-sized ice spikes. But Horiarn actually deflected them away from her with her vulture-like wings quite easily indeed here. I myself then jumped into the brand-new battle completely enough and tried sending several projectiles of various kinds her way, but Horiarn deflected them away as well, though with two or three of her python-like tails here. With that done, Horiarn began trying to hit me with several gobs of some yet-unknown sort of goo here. Goo that would possibly trap me somehow in place if I got hit by gobs of it in certain places for myself, I realized almost immediately after she began shooting such things at me.

I dodged such gobs as best as I then could, but was unfortunately not able to dodge them completely. For Horiarn soon had largely immobilized my feet with some of her goo when I was trying to bounce off a wall to get above her and attack her from a much less-defensible place for her. So I got stuck on a wall just above her normal eye level and mainly facing the ground in very short order.

Orange Hood then showed up, and began engaging Horiarn here. Even while Cyanon was trying to dodge other gobs and hunt for a weakness here, in fact, somehow. And even while I was still trying to free myself from my current predicament here, by the way. It was at this particular juncture, then, that Pakushai suddenly appeared, and charged Horiarn while her attention was otherwise diverted by Orange Hood and Cyanon. Pakushai then flashed her claws quite intensely indeed, and several dozen scratch marks of various sizes, shapes, lengths, and depths were soon quite evident in various places all over Horiarn's body here. Horiarn then sent Pakushai flying with a smack from one of her wings. And Pakushai's trajectory soon took her right to somewhere within Colleen's current reach here, as Colleen was still encircled within one of the eight python-like tails for Horiarn here. Colleen then quickly snatched Pakushai up just before she might have fallen to the ground off one of them.

Seconds later, after what looked like a very brief conversation indeed, Colleen then placed Pakushai on her head, reached inside of the coat that she'd thrown on when she'd followed us out of the music store, took out an antique-looking flute-like musical instrument of some sort, and threw it up in the air briefly, all with her right hand, for her left hand was currently unusable due to it being pinned against her side by the tail now encircling her. The flute-like instrument twirled in the air for just a few seconds before suddenly descending and coming to hover somehow directly in front of her mouth, as she proceeded to say something in a currently-unfamiliar ancient-sounding language and as a certain yet-unfamiliar symbol then appeared on her own forehead here and now. After it began hovering in front of her mouth, she then placed her right palm directly under it, as if to support it in the air here for at least a few seconds, if not even longer than that.

Then she suddenly shouted, "Batosku Blaze Power, Transform," in very short order. Almost immediately after that happened, she was completely shrouded within some yet-unknown sort of fiery sheath-like capsule, from head to toe. The fiery capsule of sorts was largely a very, very, very bright red, which quite nearly approached bright orange in color, but not quite that color, here. She remained completely shrouded in it for at least a few seconds, before the fiery capsule of sorts melted away from around her here, to reveal her in another Sailor-style fighting uniform much like the ones that Cyanon and I were now wearing here.

For starters, everyone, she had a gold tiara much like mine and Cyanon's were, but at its base, there was an amethyst, not a ruby, for her birthday was in February, as I later learned. Her shoulders had the exact same kind of shoulder pads on them that Cyanon and I now wore, but they were both mostly dark red with bright red bands just below them. The leotard-like portion of her outfit was mostly dark red with a white belt. While her uniform skirt was a mostly dark red miniskirt with three white and yellow stripes alternating white-yellow-white and a yellow hem seam. A yellow heart-shaped pendant then sat on top of a mostly dark red front bow with white and yellow trim on it as needed, as desired, and as appropriate enough here. Three similarly-colored bows were on her back, with one at each shoulder somewhere below her mostly dark red collar, one in the middle of her back, and one in the small of her back. Her elbow-length gloves were mostly bright red with at least a few yellow harp-like symbols on them and three dark red glove ring cuffs. As for the rest of her outfit at present, she had mostly bright red ^-style boots with appropriately-thick V-like bands around the tops of her lower legs and her boots, so that the bands ran around to the front of the boots with the base of the V's in question for them, along with several small harp-like symbols in yellow on them, and white boot soles. Not to mention, the presence of at least two sheaths for flute-like weapons running between her shoulders and between the bows in the middle and the small of her back, for that matter. That then completed her current look here, as the flute in front of her still hovered in front of her mouth here, somehow, by the way.

She then moved her mouth to begin playing the flute-like instrument, and music of some sort soon began coming out of it. The music had a sort of operatic quality to it, so to speak, and with much passion apparently in it. As she then played that music no-handed, in essence, tongues of flame began licking the tail currently around Sailor Batosku here, seeking any nearby weak points for her, so as to hopefully get under the scales on it well enough somehow. This continued for several minutes at least, until those flaming tongues eventually found several weakened scales that Orange Hood, Cyanon, and I had somehow damaged at least a little bit here somewhat near enough to her now.

When Batosku realized this, she then removed her still-free hand from under that flute-like instrument of hers and reached behind her for two sticks like bands' drummers might often use while playing drums or cymbals, for instance. That done, she then twirled those sticks as needed and/or desired until she had them in her free hand like chopsticks were normally held when used. Then she had Pakushai hop down to the ground and pick up a matchbook that she'd just spotted while retrieving the drumsticks that she'd just gotten for herself here. Pakushai complied immediately, and then leapt up Horiarn's body, taking much more care to avoid any flailing tails or whatever else Horiarn tried to send her way now. Mere moments later, while Orange Hood, Cyanon, and I were still diverting much of Horiarn's attention away from Pakushai and Batosku, Pakushai then placed the matchbook in question between two of Batosku's fingers on her right hand, before springing back down to the ground again and heading towards Cyanon here, so as to allow Batosku more room to work here, if needed.

Batosku soon held the matchbook between the middle and pinky fingers of her right hand, for she'd just raised her right ring finger from the position in which it had just been in when Pakushai gave her that matchbook here. She then flipped the matchbook open, before briefly bowing her head down here. She quickly bit off a match from the matchbook with her teeth, as the flute-like weapon briefly backed away from her mouth here, and then shifted the matchbook somehow directly into her right palm. After tossing the matchbook up a few inches, at most, so that it would brush up against the match she still held in her teeth, she soon was rewarded by a somewhat satisfying red flame here. That accomplished, she then rather unexpectedly threw the matchbook in my general direction here while also grabbing the match in her mouth just as quickly as she could, in one motion, the matchbook flying my way a split-second before she grabbed the match in her mouth here. She then shouted, "Aim your attacks where I throw fire, everyone," as I saw the matchbook heading my way while also dodging more goo that Horiarn was trying to pin my arms with here. She had managed to largely immobilize my legs by now, but from about mid-thigh on up, I was still able somehow to move at least a little bit, if not a lot. I caught the matchbook somewhat easily and stashed it quickly behind my sash, for all the obvious reasons here, in fact.

After she said that, several frisbee-like disks soon materialized between all the fingers and the thumb of her right hand. Also, several flaming roughly marble-sized balls appeared in her right palm. She then began to send those disks and balls at the weak points her tongues of flame had just found, just as quickly as she could. More and more of those disks and balls appeared just as quickly as she could still generate them here, even as she also resumed playing her current flute-like weapon empty-handed just as she'd done earlier here. Eventually, she found the tail's grasp on her weakening quite a bit, and actually releasing her from its previously-strong grip. When it finally did so well enough here, she quite quickly dropped to the ground, somersaulting several times as she did so, even while also somehow continuing to send still more flaming stuff towards Horiarn here.

As for me, I tried to free myself by using my sword to break through the goo, with little, if any, success on that front. At least for the time being, anyway, I did. Even while also throwing more projectiles of various kinds towards Horiarn so as to hopefully allow Orange Hood and Cyanon at least some more ability to dodge her attacks sent in their directions here. Several of my projectiles even hit her, which further diverted her attentions away from them here. Of course, that might not necessarily help things with me. But just as long as her attentions were more focused on me, for at least a little while, here and now, perhaps one of the others might better be able to deal some damage to her here, quite naturally enough.

Batosku soon roasted several of her tails, and they burned somewhat quickly indeed, causing several other people she'd been attempting to drain of their energy to fall free of them as they proceeded to be destroyed here. As I had done at least once before in a previous battle, I quickly sent several projectiles towards those falling people, so that a net might form well enough underneath them soon enough. My projectiles formed that needed net just before at least one or two of those people were about to hit the ground and possibly get killed by the fall, in fact. Quite naturally enough, then, all of them landed quite safely in that net, and they all were soon quite able to slide down to the ground on a chute leading down to it from the net, by the way. At which point, they all then fled the battle location as best as they then could here, for all the obvious enough reasons here.

As they fled, Orange Hood and Cyanon covered their escape with several spikes and grenade-like items. And Batosku then quickly stashed away her flute-like weapon and somehow summoned a harp-like weapon of some sort here. Some length of time later, then, Horiarn was largely roasted as best as Batosku could currently roast her here, and the goo that had largely been immobilizing certain parts of me suddenly vanished from where it had been. When that happened, Batosku then quickly ran under me and caught me before I hit the ground face-first, being closer to me than Orange Hood at that point in time here. The force of impact knocked us both down to the ground briefly, with her underneath me, having cushioned my fall with her own body while landing mainly, though not entirely, on her own butt here, for that matter. After we hit the ground, I soon asked her, "Are you all right, Sailor Batosku?"

"Yes, I'll be fine. Although Cyanon, Orange Hood, and the cat might not be if we don't somehow finish this monster off. This monster's trying to pin them all down in a dead-end alley, it seems to me here and now. Let's finish this thing off now, if you please."

We wasted very little time in beginning to do so, with Batosku first striking more potentially weak points her tongues of fire periodically still indicated to her somehow, and then with me following up with either slashes from my sword or more projectile-throwing here. Once we'd both begun hitting her well enough, she even turned away from Cyanon, Orange Hood, and Pakushai here at least a little bit, and they soon got the same ideas that we were thinking here, in fact.

Needless to say here, Horiarn was soon ashes very briefly before those ashes vanished just like the ashes that had been briefly left behind every so often whenever I'd actually finished off any Negaverse monsters in my previous battles as Sailor Kilakogo. As soon as they did, a brief conversation between the four of us then ensued. I welcomed Batosku to the team that was now obviously forming here, and Orange Hood was glad to see that we had all managed to take care of the monster well enough here before anyone actually might have gotten killed by it. Eventually, he left the battle's location first, as was often his wont, as I would later come to learn.

Cyanon then said, "I suppose we'd all best power down just as soon as we're in a safe enough location to do so, Kilakogo."

"Agreed." Cyanon and I soon departed the scene, and ducked into what we both thought was a sufficiently deserted alley somewhat near the battle's location, but we didn't yet realize that Batosku had actually followed us to where we'd then decided to power down here. We looked briefly around before powering down, and then did so, not yet realizing that she'd hidden herself behind a nearby dumpster for at least a few seconds. As soon as we heard a chuckle, all of a sudden, from out behind that dumpster, though, we knew that someone had seen us. And we demanded that they show themselves, of course.

Batosku soon revealed herself, and said, "Ah, so Sailors Kilakogo and Cyanon are actually two normal girls here. Interesting, I think. Rather interesting indeed. I wonder who owns the cat that I saw earlier, then."

"That cat is mine, unfortunately, it seems," I soon said.

"I think she's cute, and interesting as well, Miss Faith Kerpinsky."

"How do you know my civilian name, Sailor Batosku, if I might ask?" I soon ask.

"I heard it as you were running to the battle location earlier, Miss Kerpinsky, before you powered up along with this swimmer here. She has the smell of water on her, and you have the smell of moonlight on you, as well. Our orange-hooded ally of a sort has the smell of sunlight on him, for that matter. I smelled moonlight and sunlight at the battle you fought at and near the grocery store. I wasn't around at the AMYAC when Sailor Cyanon first appeared, but I smelled water on her while you were heading to the battle location earlier. That's right, I can somehow smell certain power-related scents of a sort, though I don't really know just why yet, if I ever will."

"I see," said Melody. "Then can you smell your own power-related scent now?"

"As a matter of fact, I can. I have a power-related scent of fire. I don't understand how and why I do just yet, if I ever will, but I still know that I do, Miss Morgan-Wade."

"Would you care to reveal your civilian identity to us all, then?" asked Pakushai, as she then appeared from somewhere nearby.

Batosku then thought about that idea in relative silence, if and whenever possible, for at least a few brief moments, if not even longer than that, and then said, once she was quite sure nobody else could somehow hear, see, or detect us all well enough here and now, "Very well, you two. I suppose I'm eventually going to have to do it, anyway, so it's probably best that I get it out of the way well enough in a timely enough manner here."

About twenty seconds or so later, at most, she quite suddenly powered down by quietly saying an appropriate enough powering-down phrase, and then revealed herself to actually be Colleen Warner in her own respective mortal life as a civilian. We were quite surprised when she did so, of course. But eventually it somehow sank in well enough for both Melody and me here, just the same.

Not too much later, then, we all returned somewhat calmly indeed to her parents' music store, where we soon resumed our previous conversation with each other. We conversed with each other there for at least another ten or so minutes, if not longer, before her parents closed the store for the rest of the current evening and/or night. When they did, Colleen soon bid us good night, and Melody and I then departed the store again for the rest of it. We briefly shopped for a little while longer, and then parted from each other for the rest of the night as well.

Pakushai was already near, if not at, the computer in my room by the time I entered it, and waiting for my thoughts on the battle that we'd fought earlier that very day, at about 7:45 pm. She hadn't been seen at supper then, for she'd decided to take a nap, as I later learned, while I'd been having supper with my parents and Lawrence between 7 and 7:30 pm. Once it was unquestionably safe enough for us to then talk to each other about the most recent battle that I'd just been part of here, she kicked up the necessary file or files on my computer. After which, we then discussed the battle at some length with each other, of course.

Eventually, she decided we'd discussed the battle and certain other related things well enough for at least the time being, and closed out that file or files as needed, desired, and appropriate enough here. Then she soon afterward slipped under the bed, into her own bed under there, and I didn't see her for the rest of the current night, at least. Once I realized sufficiently well that was most likely going to be the case, I soon picked up a few of my quilting supplies and prepared another patch for addition to the necessary quilt here. Of course, I didn't actually forget to include all the necessary details in the design for that particular patch, before then preparing it here as needed, as desired, and as appropriate. Once the patch was sufficiently made, I then applied it where needed and appropriate to the front of the quilt. With that then done sufficiently well to satisfy myself quite well enough here, at the very least, I soon stashed away all my current quilting supplies and the quilt I'd just been working on again as I normally would do after a work session with one of my quilts here. Finally, I began to get ready for bed again here as I normally would on a typical night. Because of that fact, then, I was quite soundly asleep again by no later than 11:45 pm on the night of Friday, January 18, 2008. And so I slept, quite naturally enough, for the obvious reasons here and now.

* * *

Most of the next month was spent, whenever possible, looking for a place that we Sailors could eventually use as a main base of operations in our conflict with the Negaverse. Of course, the Negaverse periodically sent various monsters to try to gather energy and wreak havoc on the local area, but we still fought them whenever necessary. At least a few monsters were able to somehow avoid being destroyed by us, and to retreat for a time, periodically, back into the Negaverse, quite naturally enough, due to our current low level of fighting experience against them here and now. But, generally speaking, we were still able to destroy most of the monsters they sent against us and the local area, more often than not. Orange Hood was at most of the battles, but not all of them, for reasons not yet known to us, if they'd ever be. Yet he was still at as many of them as he could get to well enough, just the same.

Eventually, we found a possibly suitable enough place that was about three or four miles roughly southeast of the center of town, and it was currently abandoned, for whatever possible reason or reasons here. At least for the most part, if not entirely, it was that way now, anyway. Pakushai soon did some research related to it, and found that it had last been resided on well enough roughly about three or four years ago. Specifically, it had been owned and resided on periodically by her last owner, before her eventual descent into her grave somewhere. The property we all eventually found had been held in trust every since that very same time by certain trustees Pakushai's last owner had appointed before then. It would be completely freed from that trust once a certain person was revealed as being legally eligible to claim full ownership of it sufficiently well. We didn't yet know who that would be, of course. But time most certainly would eventually make us quite aware of that sort of thing, if at all possible, we all soon figured, after somehow finding that place quite well enough while mutually exploring the local area at least a little bit whenever we had the chance to do so well enough in our respective lives, whether as Sailors or as civilians.

The property in question here that we'd found was roughly 1,600 or so acres in size, more or less. And it was completely encircled by an eight-foot-thick and sixteen-foot-high main wall around the property, except for at least a few gates which still were mostly invisible here on all four sides of it, if and whenever possible and appropriate enough. The innermost cores of the wall around the property were made of assorted stones and energy fields inside numerous hand-made and kiln-fired bricks, while the exterior layers of them were made of cut marble, granite, and adobe, from the outside in. There were only four gates visible at present of any number of potential gates on those four walls, with one being in the center of the southeast-facing wall, one in the center of the southwest-facing wall, one in the northwest-facing wall, and one in the northeast-facing wall. Above each of the four currently-visible gates here, there was some sort of an arch bearing at least one certain symbol on it, if not more than one. The main gate, though, was the one in the northwest wall. At least that was how things seemed to be for us here and now, anyway. The two longer sides for the property's borders were roughly 10,560 feet long. And the two shorter sides for them were roughly 6,600 feet long, more or less, as well.

We eventually came to the northwest wall's only currently-visible gate, and were actually allowed to pass through it once some sort of automatic property defense system had somehow scanned us well enough and also cleared us for entry into the rest of the property's territory here. Once we were sufficiently cleared for entry onto the rest of the property as needed, we all soon found ourselves walking together with each other on a moderately long and likely stone-cobbled driveway of sorts for a while, and ultimately followed it to what then appeared to be a quite good-sized palace of some yet-unknown sort here and now. As we walked together with each other on it, we also saw many sculptures, for instance, along either side of it all the way from the gate we'd just passed through to a drawbridge in the northwestern wall for the palace that could be lowered over a suitably-sized moat, if and whenever necessary. When we all got ourselves to the immediate area of that particular moat, Pakushai then quickly spoke in a still-unfamiliar language here. After which, the aforementioned drawbridge soon lowered to allow us all full access to the palace's somewhat good-sized main courtyard several dozen feet, at least, within its walls here.

The distance between the outermost walls for the palace and the innermost walls for it that faced the main courtyard just mentioned was about 120 feet, more or less, with those very same walls each about four or so feet in average thickness, all around the palace, as Pakushai soon told us all here. The main courtyard itself was roughly 240 feet by 240 feet in size, meaning that the palace was, more or less, somewhere close to 480 feet by 480 feet in size, ground level-wise. However, the highest points of the palace were each roughly 160 feet above the ground, as well, if our mutual estimations of their current heights weren't too mistaken here, just the same.

We soon came to a small garden in the middle of that main courtyard, for a brief time. And Pakushai then led us to a certain series of sculptures around a fountain in the middle of that very garden. When we got there, we soon saw several dozen figures around that fountain here. Pakushai went to a particular female figure standing near that fountain that now apparently was holding a ring of keys in her right hand here and a moderately thick, but not overly thick, scroll of some sort in her left, as a certain male figure also rested its own hands on her shoulders here. Next, Pakushai spoke to the scroll-holding sculpture in the exact same language that she'd used to make the drawbridge ultimately lower itself so that we could enter the palace ourselves easily enough here and now. Seconds later, the ring of keys then suddenly dropped from the sculpted woman's right hand. And Pakushai quickly caught the ring of keys by a tab on them in her mouth well enough here in time to avoid damage to those keys or the rings, by the way. Once she was quite sure that she'd not let them hit the ground below her here, or in front of her here, she brought the keys over to me here and now.

I soon asked, "Why are you giving me these keys, Pakushai?"

"Because, Faith, you are currently the apparent leader of your still-forming Sailor and Knight team here, at the very least, if you won't always be. Now I suggest that we all look around this particular property and see what use we might possibly somehow be able to make of it eventually. I would be more than happy to give all three of you at least a little bit of a tour here, if you all so desire me to, for that matter. I've been here plenty of times before, in fact."

So we soon toured the entire property for at least a few hours, if not even longer than that here. As we did so, certain keys somehow seemed to want to be used to unlock certain chambers, rooms, and/or areas on the property's grounds every so often. Including at least one key that was to a door that bore Kilakogo-related designs of some sort on it, for that matter. So we soon checked out any number of various places on that property until perhaps about 4:30 in the afternoon of Saturday, February 9, 2008. Not long after that, then, we returned to the figure that Pakushai had gotten the ring of keys from earlier in the palace's main courtyard, and Pakushai quickly returned the ring of keys back to where they'd been when we'd originally come to that figure in the first place. Seconds later, the aforementioned ring of keys resumed its original appearance here, and we all then began preparing to leave the entire property behind in very short order here.

We all went with each other to Tribune Park for just a little while longer. And we eventually began parting from each other for the rest of the afternoon and/or night, hopefully enough. Supposing, of course, that enough things would somehow happen well enough for each of us during the rest of the current calendar date. Pakushai and I were alone again in the park not too much later after that, then.

We remained with each other in the park for about another ten or fifteen minutes after Colleen left us alone there well enough. I sat on a bench near her for a while, while periodically glancing at any number of young kids playing with each other in it then and there. Eventually, though, of course, I got bored with doing so any longer at the present time, so I rose from that bench and set off for home not too long after that happened for me here and now.

We both arrived home again by no later than 7 in the evening, and were having supper with my parents and brother no more than fifteen minutes after that time. I told my parents and Lawrence at least a little bit, but still not a whole lot, about my day out with Pakushai and two young girls, of course. But not too much did I tell them either, for all the obvious reasons here.

I soon helped clean up after supper, and then was freed for the rest of the night at about 8 pm or so here. I soon curled up in my bed and read a roughly quarter-read novel by a random author that I'd found in a grab bag of books from a recent book sale at a nearby Public Library. The book was primarily a historical novel mostly set in medieval times, though not entirely, with a semi-inspirational romance-type feel to it, more or less. I then read much of it from about 8:20 pm to about 11:30 or so, before putting a bookmark where I decided to leave off with it for the time being, setting the book on my work desk, and beginning to get ready for bed again as needed, as desired, and as appropriate enough here, quite naturally enough.

I soon got myself a bedtime snack of cherry pie topped with chocolate chips, whipped cream, graham crackers, and several other things, along with a tall glass of chocolate milk flavored slightly with several kinds of soda and/or juices in small amounts. As I consumed my bedtime snack in my family's kitchen, I then thought about the palace that I'd visited earlier with Pakushai, Melody, and Colleen for at least a little while, if not a long while.

Eventually, though, I put all my dirty dishes in the appropriate place or places, and returned to my own room in our family residence here, for all the obvious reasons. I quickly changed quite easily indeed into a suitable enough mostly copper-colored pajama set, just before climbing back into my own bed again here, of course. And I was quite soundly asleep again by no later than 12:15 or so in the morning of Sunday, February 10, 2008. With no sufficiently needless problems and no such interruptions of any possible kind or kinds whatsoever here, I then remained quite soundly asleep in my own bed until at least 6, if not even longer than that, quite naturally enough for me here and now, by the way.

* * *

Chapter Three for this story will be, as I said, posted as soon as possible after I finally manage somehow to get it written well enough, everyone. I am hoping that I am somehow able to get it done within the next two or so months, at most, but we'll all just have to see if that'll actually be possible here, quite naturally enough. I will therefore await all of your potential chapter-related reviews or such private messages just as patiently as I possibly can here, and also really hope that they will all be quite clean, quite courteous, and quite constructive whenever they're left for me to look at here, for all the obvious reasons here, you know. Until next time, then, this is The Universal Storyteller signing off, with all the usual thoughts, et cetera, for sure, everyone! Please take care and God Bless, then, if at all possible!


End file.
